Priority: Alternate Ending
by barlovento
Summary: An alternate ending to the Mass Effect trilogy, written for a contest, using the contest hosts canon Shepard. Makes use of the Indoctrination Theory. FemShep: Colonist, War Hero, Sentinel, Garrus LI.
1. Chapter 1

((_**Disclaimer:**__ Mass Effect™ is the property of Bioware™. This short fiction borrows on and slightly alters their creation, and I do not claim any ownership of the creative and intellectual properties of the setting and characters._

_I originally wrote this story for a contest on deviantArt so Kate Shepard is **efleck's** Commander Shepard.))_**  
**

**Priority: Alternate Ending**

_by Michelle Kohler_

_**I remember... me.**_

"_Kate! Katie!"_

_Frantic voices. Ghosts... voices that are gone, voices that are phantoms in the dark corners of my mind. More real than the others, though. Conjured memories that are almost tangible. These have weight. These have dimension. Scent, touch, taste. The rain in Mindoir is heavy and humid, it churns up red-clay soil and lichen rich peat. The harvest is - was - ripe. Battered now. Broken. Atmosphere sliced through and sirens screaming in the air. Throat raw screams; falsetto. Unceasing. _

[Hard rubble stabs up against battered armor. Rain falls, but not the same. London is a wet place. It always rains in London.]

"_Katie, you stay here, you understand me? Keep Caleb close, now. Don't make a sound; quiet as can be. Don't you come out for __**anything**__, babies, not until Papa or-and- I come back, you understand?" _

_My mother's face is lovely, in the way that mothers are always lovely to children who adore them. No. My mother's face is ruined. Exposure to harsh elements have left their mark; staked their claim. No. My mother's face is crimson, sluiced and sprayed with blood not her own. Whose? Caleb [Caleb is the youngest. Caleb is the baby of the family and I must protect him, must always protect him; that's what family does.] whimpers, trying to cling to Hannah Shepard with desperation and wet words, heavier than the rain, more poignant than the screaming outside [Too close]._

"_Don't go, Momma! Please! Please don't-"_

"_Hush!" Sharper. Harder. She must be hard; she must be harder now. Stronger now. [And I'll learn this. This is the first lesson: _Strong enough to love. Hard enough to fight._] "Do as I say. Katie, you hold on to him and you __**hide**__, y'hear?" _

"_Y-yes... yes, Momma." Too young. Too fragile. I haven't called her 'momma' in years. "I won't let go, Mom. We'll hide."_

"_Good girl. I-" A baritone wail from just beyond the walls of the farmstead. It cuts through Hannah's words, blanches the skin beneath the death mask of blood and gore. She grips the shotgun in her hand [old fashioned, it still uses birdshot for crying out loud] and tears herself away. Back a step. To the door and away. "I love you! Hush now... I'll... I'll be back..."_

[The sound – **that** sound - reverberates through my skull. Painful. Too goddamned painful. The roots of my molars ache with it; the marrow in my bones. The bass growl of the Reaper scourge seizes my spine; arches my back. Breathe. **Breathe**, Kate.]

"_Shit, is he-"_

"_-took the slaving bastards out with a goddamned e-tool."_

"_-boy's flat lined."_

"_Miss? … Honey... you've got to let go of him now. It's alright. You're safe now."_

_Unknown voices. Male and female. Concerned. Strained. Horrified. Impressed. _

"_Girl's got some __**cojones**__-"_

"_-shut up, man, can't you see she's in shock?"_

"_Honey, you're gonna be fine now, but I need you to let go..." _

_Mindoir's rain is a heavy thing. It fills the senses. It lulls you to sleep and melts life into the bones. It washes-out dances and moistens first kisses stolen under alien moonlight. But it isn't rain splattered on eyelashes and sticking clothing to flesh. Caleb's sun-kissed hair now a muddy [not mud. not mud. oh god, it's not mud] ocher, resting against my chest, rising and falling not of its own accord but from the panting breathing I only vaguely register as my own. __**Let go**__, the voice says. __**Let go**__._

_And I do._

_Because I'm strong. Strong enough to love. Hard enough to fight. And I knows it's Hannah Shepard's older [knowing, loving, terrified, grieving] stronger eyes staring back at the unknown man crouched close, dressed in his Alliance utilities, bearing the insignia of a corpsman. _

"_-got a scan. Katherine Shepard. Sixteen. Boys her brother, Ca-"_

"_Got it. Katherine-"_

"_Kate."_

"_Kate... right... Can you stand now, Kate? Can you get up?"_

_I can. I do. And I'll leave Mindoir behind. But not really. Not truly. Not forever. It doesn't ruin me. It shapes me. Shapes me enough to see a boy like Caleb again later; years later. On Earth and in my dreams. In the Citadel. The Catalyst... not Caleb. Not really. That hologram, that dream, that __**thing**__, spewing its lies and defying logic. Defying what I knew in my bones to be true. It isn't Mindoir's rain. It isn't Caleb's blood or Batarian ichor. It's London and the rubble that makes this makeshift bed is jabbing and breaking and suffocating. I feel my chest heave and I know I've got to-_

"_-got to get up now, Kate."_

_I must-_

"_**BREATHE**_**, Shepard**."

Breathe. Yes. Breathe, damn it. I'm Commander Shepard and I have to bloody well _breathe_.

"_C'mon_, Shepard. _Damn it_, Kate!"

The deep, flanging voice is an immediate shot of adrenaline to my heart. It jolts and sears through me, purer than any electrical current, truer than the rubble, the rain, the ruin around me and within.

"Garrus, she needs medi-gel, let me-"

The turian's snarl serrates itself through the asari's words [_Liara? Yes. Liara. I remember._]. Turian hands, claws sheathed in flexible armor weave, tighten around my shoulder, lifting, raising. It hurts like all hell and I gasp; a ragged sound juxtaposed between protest, profanity and gratitude.

"Alright," says Liara, the strain under her voice belying the cool exterior of her experience as scientist, Adept and Shadow Broker. She always was surprisingly collected and over the years she's gotten downright formidable. "I'll work around you."

"That would be best." Garrus' words are still a low snarl, but I can hear him regaining his control, his battle composure. His grip eases but doesn't let go, merely shifts itself until I can feel the rough texture of scarred facial plates and mandibles pressed against the clammy feel of my temple, brow and cheek. He speaks again, softer now. Speaks for me, though undoubtedly it carries to at least Liara, kneeling beside them. But I think he's well past caring who hears. "C'mon, Kate. I thought I was the one supposed to get all new scars, not you. I like you fine soft and whole." His next intake of breath is ragged edged; worn to the limit and my heart breaks for him. His next words just about do me in. "Come back to me, beautiful."

There's plenty of reason to do as he commands. All of them excellent in their own right. There's too much at stake. Too much to do. Lives - an entire galaxy - on the balance, on the brink. And the certain knowledge that if I don't say something - clearly - soon, Garrus Vakarian may have a bloody heart attack. So I will my lips to move, cracked and chapped though they are; will my jaw to work though it resists; stiff and unruly. Even my damned tongue seems hell bent on making this difficult for me; dry and slightly swollen. My first attempt is a garbled mess of mumbling, but it's enough to give Garrus and Liara pause. I can feel a half-ruined mandible flex against my aching cheek; the softer, cooler touch of Liara's smaller, certain hands on my midriff. I shouldn't be able to feel how cool her hands are... which means I'm probably missing certain key elements of my armor. Nice.

"What was that, Shepard?" Liara asks, hesitantly hopeful.

Again. I try again. Because when it comes down to it I'm more brutally stubborn, tenacious and unforgiving with myself than I ever demanded of anyone else. It was always that way. Too much to see set right. Too much to solve. This time, this time I manage to form words that make sense.

"...this bar... _sucks_."

It sounds croaked and raw, but it must be understandable because Liara makes a small sound of surprise and relief and Garrus stiffens against me before a dry chuckle, gruff and somehow [like only he can manage] sarcastic.

"Seriously, Shepard? I know I'm not rich, but I've got _some_ standards."

Feeling is coming back to my outer extremities; limbs tingling and then throbbing. It's painful as hell but any veted marine knows pain is a good thing. It's the wounds that go numb; the blows that seep drowsy, dumbing peace heavy through your system; those are the ones you really have to worry about. Liara's back in action, doing god knows what and I'm fairly certain it's a good thing I'm still too out of it to tell. It's enough now just to press my cheek against his, smooth against rough, neither of us in any condition to be picky about whatever happenstance managed to keep us both alive.

"You had me worried," he whispers, the susurration heavy with emotion without the need for too many words.

"I'm hard to kill," I answer, turning his one of his own past retorts back at him. My voice sounds somewhat more human now, at least to my own ears, though it's hard to tell over the slow receding sound of my own pulse throbbing against my eardrums. "You know that."

My senses finally come back into focus, enough to become annoyed at the incessant drops of rain that keep pinging down on me. Enough to be grateful of some cool wetness to wash away what feels like a lifetime of grime and sullied disillusions. Arms feeling not quite as weighted as before, I'm able to shakily cup the mandible and jawline not pressed to my cheek. To shift my face and weakly nudge his; able to settle my eyes on his, a distinctive cerulean I never take for granted.

"You were gone," the words are shaky now, numbness and disorientation giving way to shaking. "You left... with the crew. Joker... he outran the blast and... the Mass Relays blew up... all of them... how..." A hot wave of nausea swept over me, a remembrance of droning humming in my skull and oily streaks befouling my vision. Scrunching up my eyes tight and blinking several times helps dispel the freakish nightmare memories and I force my eyes to focus again, demanding [begging] answers from him.

He looks goddamned confused, that's for sure.

Confused and not-a-little nervous, those striking eyes darting towards what I presume to be Liara's direction before they settle firmly back on my own and this close I can make out the faint reflection of my green irises deepening the cobalt there. "Kate, the Mass Relays... that would kill us all. And in what reality would we abandon you?" An edge of frustration - consternation, almost accusation - creeps into his voice, lacing growl into humming reverberation. "What the hell are you talking about, Shepard?"

Lord knows I didn't fall in love with the turian for his gentle tact.

As much as I hated to break the eye contact [lifeline] I let my eyes close, testing my lungs as I drew and released several deep breathes. It hurt. It hurt like a bitch, to be more precise, speaking of fractured ribs. Some analytical part of my mind reasoned that Liara's ministrations were probably prioritizing healing more critical wounds, logic given credence when the asari spoke up, half chastising, half apologetic, "I've dealt with the worse of it, Shepard, but you really should be seen by an actual medic."

"Well, Dr. Chakwas isn't here," I groused - mildly. I was too banged up and too distracted for more than a little grousing, truth be told. So the next words are softer, meant to ease some of the anxiety I can hear in her voice. "You've got a doctorate anyway, that's gotta count for something."

Then, before she can interject matter-of-fact protests about her field of study I force my eyes open, make myself look in her direction, soaking in her delicate features, disquieted with concern for me. "Liara. I trust you. It's alright, okay?" I try to smile at her, but I'm pretty sure it comes out more like a grimace. It'll have to do.

Struggling to sit up - Garrus shifts against me, at first like he might try to restrain me, but then, thinking better of it, helping me - I swipe back sodden blonde locks from my vision and force some semblance of authority into my tone. "What's going on? What happened while I-" was in that nightmare of a despoiled Citadel, "-while I was out of it. Did anyone make it to the conduit?"

Over my head Garrus and Liara share a look, then his eyes level on my own, visor lens crackling from damage taken during the hell we fought through to get this far. "Anderson got close but... I'm sorry, Kate, he didn't make it."

It takes a moment for me to realize the steady fall of rain feels suddenly warmer, tastes suddenly more saline because it's not rain, but tears. My own tears. It's useless to hope Garrus and Liara won't be able to tell the difference, but at least there is the relief of knowing these are two of the few people I could risk seeing me like this. Because I have to be strong. [Strong enough to love. Hard enough to fight.]

I allow myself one moment of letting my forehead rest against the bulwark of his armor-clad shoulder, the soft weight of his hand at the back of my head a greater comfort than any words he could conjure; likewise Liara's smaller, lighter hand between my shoulder blades.

_I'm proud of you, child._

I don't think any of that happened. It seems it was some twisted machinations of my own mind, tainted by... indoctrination? The very word made me shudder; dry swallow heavily to force back an upsurge of acrid bile. I don't think any of that freakish experience happened but, god... spirits... I hope he really was as proud of me as I of him.

Enough.

Pressing softly but insistently back against Garrus's hand I sat erect on my own again - mostly, at least - and cleared my throat harshly, tasting the metallic tang of blood mixed with recirculating saliva. "What happened? We charged the field to get to the conduit and..."

Liara stands, "Fill her in, Garrus. I'll make sure we're still clear here and try to reestablish our comms."

Part of me didn't want her to go, but I knew it was for the best. Already the sound of the continuing war around us was droning in on my clarifying senses, setting off alarms that were second nature to me. Part of me acknowledged her wise appraisal that Garrus wouldn't be easily coaxed from my side just now. So the soft sound of her footfall moved away, leaving me to take in my bearings.

We seemed to be holed up in a room of some kind. Or what was left of a room if two barely-there walls and the bare edges of a roof could be quantified as such. A shop front, though so severely wrecked as to be near indiscernible. A kiosk overturned there. Ravaged bodies of dead husks and foul smelling cannibals. Something that looked like 20th century furniture...

Despite myself I felt laughter scratch its way up my throat, broken on my lips. For the second time in the last few minutes Garrus looks at me with unease... until his eyes follow the line of my own gaze. His mandibles flex; the more pliant plates of his mouth shifting.

"Antique shop," he confirms.

"Classy," I quip.

My hand finds one of his and quickly, briefly, he spares the time to raise my palm to the smooth strength of his mouth, not quite supple, not quite rigid. There's a fierce possessiveness in his countenance; a defiant claim. _Mine_, it says. I press my palm there, accepting the touch of the tip of a warm, supine tongue, possessive in my own right. _Mine_, my response.

_Ours_.

He's just as well trained a soldier as I am, though [if not more so in his own way. Turians, like bloody ancient Spartans, waste no time with tender thoughts of youthful fancies] and while he keeps his grip of my hand, his tone becomes precise and clipped.

"You're right. We charged the conduit, like you said, but that's when an old friend decided to show up."

"Harbinger?"

"Yes, but at least this time he decided to spare us his one-liners. Nothing like a villain who likes to monologue. Anyway, it got nasty then. We didn't have any way to shield ourselves from its damned beams. It was a slaughter house, Kate. If Liara and I hadn't been blasted back by a strike several yards ahead I doubt we'd be talking now.

"What about me? What... where was I?"

He hesitates, an uncommon occurrence when Garrus is immersed in his element. Adorably awkward as he might be in matters of relationships, there was never a doubt as to his finesse and capability as a fighter, a soldier, a lover. As indomitably passionate a turian - person - as I've ever met. My hand presses his, urging him on.

We haven't much time.

"It's hard to describe and there was so much damned chaos. But... you... you were knocked back away from us. And... something... something from Harbinger tangled itself around you. Filled you up with bright light, like there was a sun flaring inside of you, but not steady... like with..." He didn't want to finish the words. He didn't want to dwell on the implications. Frankly, I didn't care to voice it myself, but I did, releasing a breath in a huff, the words spoken in chagrin.

"The collectors. Or Saren... yeah?"

"Yeah."

For a moment - an instant, pregnant with disastrous possibilities - his eyes searched mine, with a gaze so intense it threatened to peel away layers of me, right down to my soul. And I let him. Fearing what he might find. Defiant against the possibility. Knowing we couldn't risk—

He shook his head, brisk and firm. "No. Similar but not the same. It couldn't hold you. But it tried. Spirits, it tried, Kate, and I couldn't get to you." The break in his voice tugs at my heart, bringing back memories of its own [_I just want something to go right..._] and now it's my turn to comfort him, sibilant sounds to soothe him as best I can.

"It's alright, Garrus. You _did_ get to me, remember?"

"Yeah," he breathes, turmoil released in exhalation. Some of it, at least. "But not as fast as I'd have liked," he finishes, almost a growl. Chastising himself just as much as relieving his fury at feeling so momentarily helpless. Garrus was one of the few people I knew truly understood what it was to risk everything for those closest to you. Focus reasserts itself, though, and he continues, rising to his feet now, a sense of urgency encroaching upon us both. "Something happened though. It went on for minutes - but hell feels like forever when you're there-"

"-Don't I know it."

With a grunt - wry acknowledgement - he helps me to my feet, steadying me while surveying our parameters and finishing the reprisal. "-It was like a shockwave. Maybe backlash is a better term. No explosion or anything,"

"Thank god for small mercies."

His arm tightened around my shoulders, byrl scrutiny sliding over my form with the dual purpose of drinking in the simple relief of seeing me on my feet and a more clinical assessment of my battle readiness. There was, however; no mistaking the lingering concern in his eyes, the quizzical glint, questioning what he'd witnessed. What it meant. How it affected me. "Harbinger faltered. Not long enough for our guys to do much damage, but only because it bugged out. Mechanical bastard. Liara and I got to you and brought you here. We aren't far from the Conduit still, but Reaper forces are crawling all over and we don't know how much longer Hackett can hold out with the Crucible."

About a click away the spine-chilling scream of a Banshee pierced through the general discord, echoed in twine by one of its decrepit sisters. Reaper forces gaining ground and pushing forward in their ceaseless, brutal assault. Answering fire zinged through the heavy air, the rain settling now into a characteristic London miasma, heavy munitions lighting up phantom halos in the distance. We had to move. We had to _act_, that much was clear. The same thoughts seemed to echo through Garrus beside me, astriction drawing him to his full height, the minute plates of his nose shifting as he absorbed details of scent lost to my weaker human olfactory senses.

"Garrus," my voice faltered despite my resolve and I swallowed hard, trying again, stretching up to make up for the differences in height between us; to force his gaze onto mine. I willed mine to galvanize. "You have to leave me."

Surprise rippled over his features, subtle shifts in expression I'd come to know as well as the beat and thrum of my own heart. Surprise and then defiant denial. "Like hell I-"

"Listen to me, dammit!" My hands dropped from his face and even my fingers betrayed me in lingering beyond my command until I balled them up in fists clenched tight and pressed hard against my hips.

"Harbinger was trying to indoctrinate me. I don't think it worked but... if he could get in once..."

"It won't happen again-"

"You don't know that, Garrus!" My voice rose to nearly a shout. A stupid, rookie move and ripe for giving away our tenuous position, so I lowered it to a hiss between the grating clench of my jaws. "I could cost us everything. I won't allow it. I won't. You've _got_ to leave me."

"No!" his own heated sibilation and I had to hand it to him: His snarl was by far more intimidating than mine.

Not that it backed me down a hair.

"That's an order, Vakarian!"

Ducking his head, shoulder slightly hunched to do so, he grasped my upper arms in a resolute grip with only the barest modicum of attentiveness to my wounds. Face bare inches of mine, close enough that I could make out the faint glisten of saliva on sharp teeth before only his eyes captured my field of vision. "And you know _damned_ well," he rumbled, "just how likely I am to obey one so idiotic."

Fear tinted the outright, pigheaded defiance in his eyes. And there went my heart, pounding maddeningly in my ears again, roaring with frustration and despair both. Before I could steel myself to push my case, a voice cut in; Liara returned from her brief reconnaissance.

"What's going on?" She asked in that voice that somehow managed to sound sensuously delicate even in the midst of this hellhole, even ripe with suspicion and unease.

I turned - or I tried to. A basso reverberation thrummed in Garrus' throat and his hands clenched, hard enough to dig talons into flesh in his anger if it wasn't for the still functional status of my shoulder guards. Fine. I answered Liara side long, keeping my voice as steady as possible. "Harbinger tried to indoctrinate me, Liara." No gasp of surprise from her - was I surprised? A stranger juxtaposition of guilessness and willful intelligence existed in few people as it did in T'Soni. At least she wasn't trying to argue with me. "I'm a liability. You have to leave me behind and get to the damned conduit. **Now**."

"Garrus-"

"-don't even, T'Soni. She-" Flustered and aggravated – downright pissed, maybe – he returned his attention to me, "you _broke_ its grip on you, Shepard. You bought us some time. You're coming with us and that's final."

"Shepar-"

"-Liara, you know he's wrong! We have to-"

"_Enough_!"

A biotic pulse rippled around and from the asari, jolting over us hard enough that Garrus and I were forced to shift our stances to supporting one another rather than the awful, heated face off of moments before. It sure as hell got our attention and Liara found herself the recipient to conjoined baleful glares. To her credit she didn't even flinch. Tears streaked fresh wet tracks down azure skin, but otherwise her composure held in check. Despite myself sympathy and pride surged in my chest. "They're all _dying_ out there. Waiting for us to _do_ something. _Anything_. We don't have _time_ for this. Shepard... Kate... do you think for an instant I'd hesitate to finish you myself," all credit to her, she audaciously spared no attention to Garrus's guttural response to those words, "if I thought you were truly a danger? I? Who helped you take down my own _mother_?"

Momentarily dumbstruck, I could feel myself gaping at her. Then my mouth shut with an almost audible click and I could feel my resolve [my fears] begin to waver. My knees - traitorous joints - threatened to buckle as I swayed precariously, literally and figuratively both. "EDI. The Geth... I saw them all destroyed. I saw it all destroyed and all of you stranded, abandoned..." A raw, keening whistle seemed to creep into the space around us; a sound I only belatedly recognized as my own labored breathing. This time Garrus didn't limit his hold to my shoulders, his presence was solid and whole, pressed close to my back, arms engulfing me, mandibles and plates shifting my sullied, tangled hair, brushing over the scraped sensitivity of my left ear. If anything his sudden tenderness - protectiveness - served to further undo me. He and I did not have a relationship one would call prone to 'PDA', saving our intimacies for private moments; safe moments. Whatever he saw after Harbingers attack, whatever hell he went through thinking me taken from him [again], it had loosened something in him, as well.

"I couldn't save you," I groaned into bare, battered hands. "I have to... I can't... I won't..."

Garrus's arms tightened around me, sheltering, like he might hold together the fragments of myself finally threatening to fall all to pieces, to utter shambles. Cobalt hands rose to my own, pulling them away from my face with gentle insistence. "You broke its hold, Shepard. Kate," her voice demanded my recognition, called my attention to focus on eyes the colour of sapphires. "You are **not** indoctrinated. Harbinger tried. And failed."

"How can you be so sure?" Was that my voice? So small? Uncertain? What few, rare, dangerous, fragile moments had I ever allowed myself to be the one needing reassurances? The one needing saved. "What if I'm just deluding myself like Saren or the Illusive Man or...

"Kate," Garrus interrupted, his voice a heat beside my ear, a life preserver keeping my head just barely above water. "Do you think we wouldn't make sure ourselves?" The admission is tinged with guilt, laced with vexation at voicing the words aloud and I watch as Liara meets his gaze up and over my shoulder, her eyes apologetic but firm.

Confused, I let hand hands slip from Liara's loose, softly rubbing hold, allowing them to rest over the smooth lines of Garrus's armor clad forearms. "What do you mean?" I can feel my eyes narrowing with the words spoken, but it is hope more than suspicion that syncopates my pulse.

"Vendetta, Shepard," Liara intones, activating her omni-tool, from which a spherical hologram forms, its lighting green-lit as malachite phosphorescence. "The Prothean VI from the Temple of Athame - remember? It can detect the Indoctrinated. I checked, while Garrus was, ah... waking you up."

For the barest moment I could call myself nothing less than confounded. Disconcerted. I must have started gapping again, mouth open and generally uncouth [further testimony of how shaken I was by all of this] because Garrus shifted his hold again, turning me about now, one thin-gloved hand slipping to cup my chin, lifting it slightly. "I'd have told you as much if you stopped to listen," his words tenderly spoken, though interwoven with hints of his usual wryness and the last vestiges of his recent flare of temper.

A thousand questions - and half as many doubts - ran rampant in my mind; a shell-shocked and abused mind, so recently violated in a struggle with a being beyond my comprehension. But I hadn't gotten this far - I hadn't accomplished this much - from being given to bending knee to a torrent of inner demons.

Strong enough to love.

Hard enough to fight.

"Well," dry-mouthed, but audible and gaining strength, I looked up into turian eyes and then sidelong towards the asari's, "What the hell are we standing around here for?"

Turian mouths are not built for grinning the way humans' are. But once you get used to them [once you find the reason to learn all you can about reading those facial expressions and one in particular] it's easy to tell when a close approximation washes over their features. Easier still when it lightens the very tenor of their distinctive voices. "That's my girl. Let's move."

It's like someone flicked a switch inside of me, revving up my exhausted, rather broken body [mind. soul.] with a renewed resurgence of purpose. Energy coming from reserves still [even now, after all these years] untapped. I stand back, on my own, without support, my fingertips pausing only to hook momentarily against his hand and then release.

"I need my gun."

"Right here," he announces, unstrapping my M-55 Argus from his back and holding it out, then taking up his own M-98 Widow.

"Liara, did you make contact?"

"No, but there was a rendezvous point settled ahead of time, not far from here. It won't be easy to get there, but it's our best shot, unless you want to go straight for the conduit?"

"Will the RZ deviate us away from the conduit by far?"

"No, it's close, just further South from here."

Garrus has already moved away, climbing and boosting his way up to the ledge of the broken down ceiling, peering through his scope with eyes sharper than even my Lazarus enhanced vision can manage [and he loves to point that out]. "We're definitely gonna hit some trouble if we go groundside."

"Rooftop access?"

"Unstable, but there."

"Well, hell, it wouldn't be a good fight if they made it easy on us."

"Feeling a little reckless, Shepard? That's unlike you."

"Feeling a _lot_ pissed off, Vakarian."

"Now _that_ I like. So long as it's not at me."

The chuckle from my raw throat sounds wretched, but the smile would suffice, even if stung like hell on lips cracked and chaffed. "Liara," I start, looking back her way as she readies her N7 Eagle. She casts a glance towards me, her lips quirking, "I'll be careful, Shepard."

On impulse I clasp my hand to her shoulder and duck my head to hers affectionately. Gratefully.

"Let's move."

* * *

"Dammit! They're flanking the RZ!"

"They're in trouble, Shepard!"

"No _shit_, Vakarain! Think you can-"

"—You _do_ remember who you're talking to, right?"

"Yeah, less gloating! More Cannibals rotting! Liara, that alley on the RZs three: Choke it with a Singularity!"

The sound of the heat clip ejecting from the Argus's chamber was all but lost amidst the growing pandemonium as Reaper forces continued their encroaching assault on the makeshift RZ below our precarious perch atop early 20th century architecture. With a grunt of effort I hurled a biotic field heavy enough to launch a Marauder from a ledge, catching the blasphemy that was once a turian right as it was sending out ropes of reinforcing armor to the Cannibals feasting on their own fallen. Jaw clenched, I took a running leap from one decrepit ledge to the other, thankful for a surge of adrenaline pumping in fatigued muscles, about the only thing letting me ignore the fact I'm probably doing a fine job undoing what Liara was able to patch up earlier. If it wasn't for modern medicine I'd probably look like Frankenstein's fucked up cyborg cousin, anyway.

"Frag Out!" Warning shouted, I ignored the vocal protest of my left shoulder as I lobbed the lift grenades at Liara's fresh planted singularity field. Just enough time for Liara to dodge down to cover behind what was left of an old-fashioned chimney before the resulting biotic explosion sent aftershock jolts rippling through our sinew.

I let my eyes focus on the welcome sight of continued fire from the ramshackle RZ, its inhabitants fighting off the forward wave of mingled husks, cannibals and marauders. Sure of that flank at least, I sprinted to the far end of this last rooftop where, below, distracted once-Batarian beasts tore chunks out of the fresh and the old dead. The kick of my rifle was something I barely registered anymore, compensating for it naturally as I sprayed preliminary fire below me before taking the plunge.

Somewhere behind me I heard Garrus swear an oath my translator couldn't quite handle.

The stench of these monstrosities is an overwhelming thing, incapable of describing adequately. Imagine the worst blend of sewage, rotten raw meat and acrid vomit and you might – _might_ – come close. It's only real advantage was rendering it next to impossible for these things to ambush you. Not that they were _quiet_, anyway. In the midst of them as I was as I let my knees flex with my landing it was all I could do to choke back bile between the reek and the protests of battered abdominal muscles. Never mind. My focus is on one thing: Triggering the detonator on my Tech Armor while the staggered freaks are still close, grabbing and tearing. A fresh gush of unspeakable fluids splatters over my damaged armor, but mercifully none of it gets on my face or – ugh – in my mouth. A risky move, sure, but a job well done, I reason, surveying the remains of this group or what can be identified amidst the gore.

_**Zzzzzzzz-CRACK**_

The bullet flies what feels like a hair away from my right ear and I pivot in time to see a marauder crumble behind me, the little that's left of its head hanging by viscous strings.

With a heavy thud, Garrus drops down from the rooftop, his expression a smirk though his eyes register with more than a little annoyance.

"One of these days, Shepard, you're gonna pull crap like that and I'm not going to be at liberty to save your ass."

Snorting – a good means of covering a nagging sense of vertigo that wants to squelch my equilibrium – I rolled my shoulders, "What? I had to leave _something_ for you." Trying to will away the urge to hunch over the growing pain in my lower left side, I turned my head again. "Liara?"

"Here, Shepard." Sheathed in the glowing cerulean of biotic tendrils, she eased her own form down from the dilapidated roof, drifting to her feet with maddening ease. One of these days I was really, _really_ going to have to learn that trick, dammit.

From the periphery of my vision I accessed their state: Both were in better shape than I was, but that wasn't really saying much. Liara was developing a limp and, among other things, if Garrus's visor fritzed anymore it could bloody well damage an eye. I happened to like both of those eyes intact, but I knew better than to suggest he lose the visor. The named burned into its surface were his own reminder of past burdens to bear and I was the last person to question it.

"Sounds like they're mopping up in there," Garrus broke in, cocking his head towards the tumble-down building being used as an RZ.

"Let's get in. If we're lucky there'll be a break between waves. We can gather some intel and keep on moving."

Trudging through the rubble of war – broken terrain, jagged concrete and corpses – I took point, leading us to the near wall of the RZ, back pressed against it as we eased parallel along the walls length to the blown out opening where bay windows once stood.

"Commander Shepard with the Alliance!" I bellowed ahead of myself, letting the battle savaged inhabitants of the building know we were friendlies. "It'd be just about awesome if you didn't shoot me!"

For a moment there's a break in noise from within. A pause in the sound of men and women coughing, reloading heat sinks, shuffling and all the other myriad things that go on between waves of an ongoing assault. Then two voices broke through, one male and British, the other female and underscored by the synthetic reverberation of air filters.

"Farkin' 'ell, it's bout bloody time we got some damned luck our way."

"_Keelah_! Shepard! You're alive!"

I eased myself over the busted windowsill, mindful of the remnants of jagged plate glass still protruding from a few locations. Garrus was silent as he used a hand to steady me at elbow, back, and then hip while I managed the maneuver, making sure I was well clear before lending a hand to Liara's progress. Safely on the other side I had just enough time to tag the British voice to the face of Major Coats – haggard with fatigue and ground battle - before several pounds of quarian relief nearly bowled me over in Tali's exuberance at seeing me alive. My body screamed its protest and I couldn't help but groan at the impact, though I did manage to raise an arm around her slender shoulders, squeezing weakly as ligaments and muscle trembled with lassitude.

"You're alive! Oh, _Keelah_, Shepard I thought… I was afraid…"

"Tali, shhh," I grimaced, patting the hooded, suited back of her head before trying to work my way out of what was becoming an increasingly painful grasp. "I'm fine, Tali, but I kind of need to breathe…"

"Oh! Right! Right… sorry," she backed off, her embrace becoming less confining and more supportive, the faintly glowing orbs behind her iridescent purple mask shifting as she surveyed my state and that of our companions. "What happened? We saw…"

"Another time, Tali," Garrus cuts in, taking his accustomed position at my right flank, close enough to murmur sotto voice near my ear. "You should sit down, Kate."

Barely letting my eyes touch his, I shake my head fractionally. The brief contact is enough between us, though, and he nods: slight and curt, but with acquiescence. If I sat down now I might not get back up. He may not like it, but he knew better than to argue.

"Major Coats," I turned my attention towards the marine, famous among London forces for his three-day hold out in Big Ben, "Status report."

Wiping sweat and grime from his brow, he jerked his head in the direction of a – functioning, thank god! – comms holo. It blinked and fritzed, but it was still working, highlighting the layout of the dead-man's zone south of us. "Conduit is still operational, Commander, but it's all dahn the Karzai from there. More Reaper vermin crawling down there now than nits on a whore. That big bastard Reaper did one, but that's the only good news I've got for yer."

"Hackett and the Crucible?"

"Yeh, we've got weak comm-link back running and they're holding out with blockade support from Sword n' Shield, but there's no tellin' how long they'll manage."

"Has anyone made it to the Conduit?"

"Some o'yer troops left ten mike's back, hell bent for a run," his tone begrudgingly dismissive of their chances.

"Who?" I asked, looking towards Tali now, who was furiously working her omni-tool, obviously the one to thank for any working holos and comms at all. God bless quarian engineers.

"Javik, James, Kaidan and EDI."

"Thank the Goddess they've made it this far," Liara breathed from where she studied the glitching map.

"Heh," a sonorous sound of dry respect rippled from Garrus's throat, "nothing like a fifty-thousand-year-old vendetta to motivate you."

"And frag-grenades," I snorted, distracted in my smirk, "Vega has _lots_ of grenades."

For as long a moment as I could spare, I surveyed the screen before me, _willing_ some likely opening to manifest itself in that hell-hole of writhing enemy masses. Ever uncannily in tune with my thoughts, Garrus hovered a gloved fingertip over the far right flank, "Staring at it won't make it any better,"

"I don't know," I interjected under my breath, "Staring at _you_ makes me get all sorts of creative."

There's a startled sound, nearly a guffaw, then he clears his throat gruffly, regaining his composure and shooting me a look both bemused and shushing. "But we might be able to move up the flank here, using the out buildings as a defilade-"

"Or," interrupts a new voice entirely, a female voice, underscored with pain, but steady. "You could do it the _smart_ way." An impressive amount of firepower – held in the hands of soldiers nerve-shot and drained – swiveled in the direction of the voice. With the characteristic flicker-waver-distortion of a cloaking shield coming down, I found myself looking down the barrel at none other than Kasumi Goto. Kasumi Goto with a hand pressed to her right side, the fabric there darker than the rest of her sleek outfit. Even more unsettling: Kasumi Goto with her hood down. I've never seen her without that hood in place and for a moment that's more startling to me than her sudden appearance [after all, you get used to that kind of thing from Kasumi] or her wounded state. Some part of my mind registers that her hair is long, not cropped short as I always imagined it would be, styled in a myriad of braids in various sizes and twisted up with complex eccentricity that somehow managed to be remarkably graceful.

Utterly unfazed by the myriad muzzles pointed her way, she shrugs gingerly, a ghost of her usual saucy smile crossing her lips and finishes her suggestion, "The Kasumi way. Really, Shep, didn't I teach you _anything_?"

"It's alright," Garrus informs the others as he and I holster our weapons. "She's with us."

"Kasumi, you're hurt!" Tali exclaims, moving towards the petite Japanese woman. It's just as well: Tali got to her just as Kasumi started to collapse. "Get some med-packs and a field-kit! Stat," I call out while I quick-step close on Liara's heels with Garrus lingering not far behind, shadowing my movements with all the air of a bodyguard. Tali proceeds to help support Kasumi, helping her hobble to a nearby crate, before Liara interrupts, "It's an abdominal wound, Tali… she needs to be laid out."

A spell broken – a collectively held breath, fat with tension – people begin to move again. Field-kits are extracted, poncho liners and metallic-sheened thermal blankets making a makeshift bed while Liara gets to work inspecting Goto's wounds. After barking some orders I'm soon kneeling across from Liara, finding and grasping one of Kasumi's hands, barely cognizant of how its slick with blood. You get used to that kind of thing real quick in my line of work, after all. The blood, the gore: You become desensitized to it. You work through it. But my heart still tightens.

My heart never _quite_ learned to be a marine like the rest of me.

Giving her hand a squeeze I drag my eyes away from the strange marvel of actually seeing the whole of her head for the first time and try to summon up a smile for her, "Hell of a time to decide you missed suicide runs, Kasumi."

"You know me, Shep: Always looking to surprise." With a pained chortle and a scowl at her situation – and no doubt Liara's ministrations with omni-tool and medi-gel at Kasumi's waist – the Japanese woman let dark eyes [Striking and almond shaped: the things your mind picks up on even in the most stressful situations is beyond me] – settle on my own. "I had something important to give you and the normal courier routes just aren't what they used to be, you know, giant reaper invasion and all."

"Damned reapers always cramping your style."

"You got that right," she quipped back. Some of the tight, clenching feeling in my heart eased a bit to hear it. She wasn't in great shape, but I'd seen a lot worse. A glance to Liara to check the asari's composure further assured me Kasumi's situation wasn't grave. Not yet at least. "Took me long enough to find you, too. Sorry about that."

"Better late than never," Tali consoled. [Another quirky thought, let free from coming down of the telescope vision of the heat of battle: Why did Tali's voice sound somewhat Slavic in its accent? Why would translators pick up on that kind of thing? Weird. _Focus, Kate_.]

"Well, Garrus is easier to track than Shep."

"I am?" the turian spoke up from his rather stiff-seeming crouch to my right and a little back.

"Sure are, big guy. Armored, two-big-toed foot prints. Bad guys missing heads… or most of their heads."

"Well if you were following a path of destruction, Shepard leaves more of a mess than I do."

"She does, doesn't she? But your style is easier to distinguish."

"It's a talent."

As much as their banter did my erratic heart some good, time was not on our side. There were any number of questions I'd love to ask, but only one that got to the point. "You said you had something for me?"

"Yeah," she nodded slightly, wincing a bit. "Just in time, too. Sounds like you guys were about to validate Einstein's definition of insanity."

"Who's that?"

"What's that?" Tali and Garrus respectively asked on each other's heels.

"'Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,'" Liara quoted, then blinked at four sets of eyes set on her direction, some more quizzical than others. "I read a lot," she explained, with asperity and a touch of defensiveness.

The asari would never cease to surprise me, but that wasn't getting us any closer to the Citadel. "Kasumi, explain?"

"Charging the Conduit… again. Out in the open. And expecting a different result."

"Comms verify that Harbinger is still out of Earth's atmosphere and not on the scene," Coats broke in, his tone a bit testy.

"But that doesn't mean the area around the conduit is any safer-" I backed Kasumi up.

"—Or that another reaper might not decide to throw back in," she agreed.

"What have you got for us, Goto?" Garrus asked while the rest of us leaned in slightly to hear.

"A late birthday present for you, Shep," she slipped her hand from mine – aided by the slickness of blood there, slowly growing tacky as it coagulated. Activating her omni-tool as she continued, "Improved cloaking. Way better duration and software capable of tracking and maintaining multiple synched units. With any luck – and if you play it smart – a small group of you should be able to make it to the Conduit undetected. Just, you know, don't bump into anyone."

Already Tali had her own omni-tool activated, synching with Kasumi's as my two tech-geniuses fell to softly spoken queries and direction.

"I'm feeling better already," Garrus murmured in an aside to Liara and me.

"Really? It's hard to tell," Liara replayed, a rare venture into teasing.

"It's a warm feeling on the inside."

"He's a ball of sunshine on the inside," I said, with wryness and affection. My attention soon turned back to Kasumi, though, and I raised an eyebrow at her. "Where'd you get this?"

"Well, Shep," the mischievous smile I knew so well lit up slowly; dimmer than usual, but still wonderful to see. "It's like you said: All that advanced tech just lying around and no one checked my pockets."

"I could kiss you," I laughed – sort of. It sounded more like a low hacking noise, really.

"I'll settle for your saving the galaxy in my name."

"Done," I took and squeezed her hand again. Releasing it I got back to my feet with a grunt. "Alright, we need to get going. Liara, I want you to stay here. Tend to wounds and help them hold this position: We need our comms intact."

"Understood," she responded, after only a brief hesitation. I could tell she'd rather be part of the team going in, but she didn't question me here, thank god. The truth was that – for all her capabilities and amazing helpfulness – part of me still couldn't help but worry about what the kind of madness we were about to go into would do to her sensibilities. Something I'd probably spare Tali from as well, if I had my druthers, but I needed her skills as one of the most brilliant engineers I knew.

"Tali, you're with me-"

"—and me," chimed in Garrus. Not a question but a statement of fact and I sure as hell wasn't going to argue it. [Though that softer part – that place in my heart – it wanted to_._]

"It's going to take some time to upload and synch the software," Kasumi spoke, regretfully.

"Actually," Tali said, her attention focused on whatever her quick, clever fingers where working out on her omni-tool, "I'm almost done."

"What," Kasumi asked, her surprise clear, surprise strong enough to get her to prop herself up on an elbow; driven by professional competitiveness and curiosity, no doubt. "How are you managing that?"

"Upgrades," explained Tali, with a touch of chagrin. "Geth upgrades. There's a geth downloaded into my suit."

"How is that…. What… oh, never mind. I miss all the fun," Kasumi groused quietly, laying herself back down.

Despite the unexpected boon of this newfound collaboration between geth and quarians, I couldn't help but look at Tali with concern, "Are you alright with that?"

Snorting behind her mask, Tali waved a hand dismissively before going back to work, "It's strange, but not unbearable. And I've never had better processing times. It's like having EDI around… without the bad jokes or mooning over Joker."

Somewhere off near the comm display, Major Coats was shaking his head, grumbling near indistinguishably, though I think I caught something along the lines of 'Geth uploaded into Quarian suits – bloody madness. Now I've seen it all.'

He didn't know the half of it.

"Done," Tali declared, motioning for Garrus and me to go ahead and deactivate our own omni-tools.

"Alright, restock on heat sinks and grenades. No amount of cloaking is likely to help us much once we get up to the processing center the conduit probably leads to," I could feel my mouth set at a grim line. Our only real hope there was that-

"If they made it up the conduit, Javik and the others have probably dealt with some of it," Garrus spoke up, with a cheerlessness to match the set of my lips, echoing my thoughts precisely. "Maybe cut us a swath; provided a diversion."

_Maybe dead. Maybe dying right now._

Despite all his warnings and caution, I could never easily accept Garrus's 'ruthless calculus of war.' And I refused to turn my squad mates into numbers; into nothing more than combat tactics, like pawns on a board.

"Then it's high time we go lend them a hand," I asserted, packing spare clips and refreshed grenade capsules, ready to charge them with biotic fields. A shadow crossed close: Liara, holding out stims. I made a moue of distaste, but nodded. I needed the boost, plain and simple. First me, then Garrus – both of us got our own little custom cocktail from T'Soni and I felt the rush of chemically enhanced clarity and vigor course through my veins. Tugging my armor back in place, I looked around to the others in the RZ: Friends. Fellow marines.

"Hold. Whatever you do, do _not_ lose this post." I made myself look them in the eyes, as many as I could, turning a small half circuit as they paused in their activities, even the sentries cocking an ear in my direction. "Never worked with finer." My words were simple: I could only hope they conveyed even a measure of my sincerity. "I'm proud of you. All of you."

With bone-deep precision, Major Coats snapped to attention; full salute. "Been a bloody honor, Commander."

Along the line, around the room, others snapped salutes, grime on their faces and fervor in their eyes. Fear and hope twin lights in their chests. '_Commander!'_ some called. '_Shepard!'_ others. I returned their salutes smartly, holding for as long as I dared before the stinging in my eyes might become tears on my cheeks. Breaking the salute, they followed in kind and I turned to Tali and Garrus.

"Ready?"

"You need to ask?" said Garrus, the question rhetorical.

"Give 'em hell, Shep!" chirped Kasumi from her makeshift bed, "Snipe some for me, Garrus."

"We'll see you soon," Liara spoke, velvet promises... or maybe a prayer.

One last look… then I jerked my chin towards the Eastern exit.

"Move out!"


	2. Chapter 2

((_**Disclaimer:**__ Mass Effect™ is the property of Bioware™. This short fiction borrows on and slightly alters their creation, and I do not claim any ownership of the creative and intellectual properties of the setting and characters._

_I originally wrote this story for a contest on deviantArt so Kate Shepard is __**efleck**__'s Commander Shepard.))_

* * *

"I thought they were sending _humans_ _up_ the conduit," Tali whispers near my ear as we skirt and evade another group of cannibals devouring their own; a charging brute hell bent on an advancing force from Aralakh company. "Not sending their own forces back up."

I nodded with trepidation, trying not to focus on the wavering outline of her shielded form in my periphery: It was like trying to focus on a heat mirage and made me damned nauseous. Instead I let my eyes dart from our destination to the surrounding pandemonium of this lurid nightmare around us. "Might be reinforcements going back in if Kaidan and the others are raising enough hell," I replied, sotto voice or at least its equivalent among barbaric shrieks, heavy fire and battle cries.

"Might be," Garrus started only to interrupt himself with an alert snarl, "Crap! Ravenger, watch it-"

We moved, darting obstacles that barely registered beyond being something-in-my-goddamned-way. With a shriek a rachni soldier threw itself on its twisted, reaper-despoiled counterpart, the Ravenger's volley of fire going erratic as swarmer's burst from within it, wet and squelching.

"We need a distraction!" Shouting as I ran, I pressed the communications bud just behind my ear, hoping Major Coats might be able to rally up something to draw attention away from conduit. The krogan and rachni push [_this war made strange, strange allies_] was helping, but whatever was happening in the Citadel was apparently deemed worthy enough to continue syphoning Reaper troops back up that fucking beam.

**Commander, do you read?**

It was Liara's voice, not the Major, but I wasn't about to argue… and her voice was more soothing anyway.

"We need to help the krogan and rachni draw forces away from the conduit!"

"Spirits, would you look at that!" Garrus's voice was shocked but also – strangely – excited, much the same way he tended to get when he pulled off some ridiculously difficult shot or found a new shiny gun. Momentarily diverted, my gaze swiveled and immediately caught the object of his awe and delight: A krogan charging into the midst of the fray atop the back of a massive rachni brood warrior.

"Crazy _bosh'tets_! They're insane!"

"Insane… but you can't doubt their panache!"

"Alright, you two," I called them to order as we continued to move, and then spoke up again. "Liara, do you read-"

The deafening sound of a low flying craft roared over our heads, sending us splayed to the prone in muck, slaughter and jagged rubble. Garrus cut off an instinctive howl of pain with a deep, troubling growl and I started to low-crawl towards his hazy outline while my head turned to trace the vehicle, dreading the appearance of smaller reaper air support. Instead I made out the sleek, deceptively simple lines of an asari drop shuttle.

"What the fuck?"

**That little present my father gave me, remember?**Responded Liara over the comm and she sounded damned satisfied with herself. Liar's voice in my ear, I watched as asari commandos started leaping from the shuttle and throwing themselves into the fray with a fantastic display of biotic might that boggled the mind.

"When this is done, remind me to buy Aethyta a drink!"

**Goddess be with you, Kate.**

My grimy fingers touched on Garrus's armor, apparently on a bad spot because he hissed between his teeth and I could feel rather than see him jerk. "Can you get up?" My voice broke a little on the question, a feeling close to panic rising in my chest.

"_Fuck_. Yes," he grunted each word explosively, obviously gritting back aching pain, but pushing himself to his feet atop the treacherous terrain.

"If we're going to take advantage of Hells Angels over there we've got to go!"

"I've got this side, Shepard," Tali spoke up, flanking Garrus on his left while I lingered close at his right.

The hair-rising screams of aptly named banshees pierced the night, the sound sharper than the throbbing light of the ongoing firefight. Despite myself I shuddered and heard Tali utter something either curse or prayer. "C'mon," I ordered, ready to haul Garrus if need be. I was thankful beyond words when he started to run on his own. What I could catch of his erratic breathing spoke volumes of the acute pain he must be in. "Run!"

100 yards, give or take, never felt longer in my life.

As one the three of us stuttered in our gait, an instinctive desire to flee away from the strange, incandescent beam of what I could only assume was some kind of sustained biotic field. Flashes of my recent dreadful face off with reaper indoctrination flickered in my mind's eye and I could feel my bottom clench, the primal flattening of a tail evolution had long ago stripped away from human beings _en utero_. It was almost instantaneous, barely a moment, before I heard Garrus thunder "NOW!" in my ear. Then he bull rushed Tali and I along with him, straight into the alien beam.

Weightless, nauseating vertigo assailed us.

I think I screamed. Possibly it was Tali. Perhaps it was all three of us.

My ears popped sorely at the rapid ascents shift in pressure; acidic bile rose in my throat; any sense of equilibrium shot to hell.

Mercifully, the torture of the transition – transportation – was brief. It was downright jarring in its brevity. I was aware of Tali gasping and Garrus's sounds of stifled pain before my mind registered the stinging, jolting impact of my body against unrelenting metal flooring. A detached part of my brain observed with dismay that the sickening crack was probably my cheek bone fracturing.

I'll admit it: For one wretched, gutless moment I kept my eyes scrunched closed. I dreaded to open them and find myself in the red-glow charnel house from my waking dream; worse still than the abomination of the Collector ship.

"Kate?" Garrus's voice was edged with alarm.

[_Strong enough to love. Hard enough to fight_.]

I forced my eyes open, forced my head up to take in our immediate situation. "I'm good," I croaked.

"Let's not do that again."

"_Keelah_, **please**," Tali agreed shakily. Our cloaking shields were defunct now and I was able to glance at them from the corner of my vision while I tried to place our location. All around us was unspeakable foulness, not so very far off from my mindfuck visions. At least the lightening was a normal spectrum, though it flickered in and out erratically with a slight strobe effect that made me grimace. No heaps of dead bodies, though there were cadavers strewn here and there. No lone keeper tending amidst the carnage with macabre calm. Clearly this area was used for transit and evidently those coming and going where bloody and broken or decrepit and twisted. But outside of that it seemed to be an auxiliary hallway, one of the many back passages that connect various levels of the Wards and grants access from the Wards to the Presidium.

I realized I was clenching my Argus in my hands, white-knuckled; every fiber of me ready for what I was sure was going to be immediate, vicious confrontation. But the hall was relatively quiet, the din of combat and yelling distant enough to be muted. Tali was up, but [my stomach took a dive to the vicinity of my knees] I realized Garrus wasn't. Scrambling over to him I reached for his arm. He immediately shuddered with panting breaths, mandibles flexing and pointed teeth visible in his pain.

"Shoulder," he grated, tight voiced, the words coming in gasps, "it's dislocated." And then, with a sharp indignation tightening the reverb of his words, "what the hell are you laughing at?"

I wouldn't have called it laughter, myself, more like a nervous, broken titter released along with the loosening of anxiety and tension inside of me. "Sorry, sorry," gathering my wits about me I rose up on me knees, the armor plates there cracked and uncomfortable, and started to deal with the assorted straps and closures that held together the greaves and plates covering his arm. "It was relief: A dislocated shoulder we can deal with."

No matter the medical advancements of spacefaring civilizations such as ours there was still no end to the battle wounds that couldn't be fixed by a quick application of medi-gel.

"She's got a point," Tali said, moving to help me wrest armor away.

"Yes, but it's still – ow! – _my_ damned shoulder – careful! – we're about to jam back – _nnrg_ – into socket!"

"Come on, Garrus, don't you trust us?"

"Right now, Tali…. Ugh… spirits, I think I might be sick…"

"You know," I joined, "you didn't bitch half this much when you were injured on Omega…"

"Only because… aaaaaugh," a particularly curdling sound broke his staggered, breathy words. Tali and I were doing our best to move the arm as little as possible, but battlefield triage was no place for gentle coddling. I hardened myself against the hurt of causing someone pain in order to help them [bad at the best of times, worse under stress and stims and working on someone you love] and removed the last piece of gear. My eyes caught and held Tali's over Garrus's exposed shoulder where Tali ripped fabric away, tearing away from the obviously warped anatomy of an arm out of socket. We had to act fast and we had to keep him talking.

"Yeah, Omega was a little worse for you," I continued while Tali activated her omni-tool. **Yes, Creator Tali'Zorah, **a geth voice spoke and Tali fired back, "Give me a musculoskeletal diagram of an intact turian shoulder, left quarter." **Affirmative, Creator Tali'Zorah.**

"Fantastic," groaned Garrus, "I'm in the hands of a quarian, a human and a disembodied geth."

"Well," I grunted, helping him sit up at a better angle. "Christ you're heavy, Vakarian."

"Who's bitching now?"

"Shut up. Like I was saying: Tali's an engineer…"

"…I'm not a derelict ship for her to tinker on!"

"And," I continued, ignoring him. Frankly, little of my attention was truly on the conversation at hand. I was engaged in a tight-rope walk between focusing on what I was about to do… and patently trying not to _dwell_ on the same. "I happen to be pretty damned familiar with turian anatomy now."

"_Wrong_ person putting the _wrong_ thing in the _wrong_ hole."

Tali sniggered with surprised laughter at Garrus's quick, growly retort. Immediately she coughed self-consciously and spoke again, "Here it is, Shepard."

I looked up at the diagram displayed in three dimensional holographic form, squinting slightly as I tried to spot anything vastly different from how a human shoulder works. Garrus moaned again, whether in pain or from apprehension of my five-second crash course on turian joint structure was anyone's guess.

"Alright, Tali, hold him still." I clenched my molars and let my hands slip, barely touching his arm, one hand finding his elbow, the other slipped under at the lower forearm. The feel of shimmering bone-plates and tough hide seemed cool and clammy to my touch, but maybe that was just my own physiological reaction, humanizing the alien beneath my hands. "On three, OK?"

Tali nodded sharply, getting into position and Garrus sucked in his breath, sharp teeth grating. From the corner of my eyes I saw Tali hand him something. I was momentarily confused until I realized she was giving him her sheathed bowie knife. Garrus took it with his good hand, rumbled a sound of terse gratitude, and fit it awkwardly between his teeth at an angle to compensate for his mandibles.

"Garrus," I looked his way, now, his eyes pivoting to mine. "I'm sorry 'bout this... I love you."

The hand that had just taken the knife lifted to touch my cheek, briefly. "I know," he answered around the knife. "Do it, Kate."

Willing my body to lose some of its stressed rigidity, I focused on his arm. "One," I shifted my fingers slightly and breathed out, "Two." I sucked in a full breath and felt the anticipatory tension shift in his muscles. "_Three_," Quickly, sharp on the heels of 'Two' before he tensed badly enough to increase the chance of breaking something. I grasped his arm firmly at elbow and forearm, lifted with a heave to achieve the proper angle and pushed, huffing with the effort.

The roar of a turian in severe, anguished pain is a terrible thing to hear.

"_Keelah_," Tali breathed, struggling to hold the turian somewhat steady. "Bite down, Garrus! Hurry, Shepard, please," she pleaded.

Sweat beaded along my already grimy scalp and my face ached from the crash landing on the metal floor mere minutes ago; the strain of trying to apply just the right balance of correct angle, support and force was excruciating, made worse by fighting my own hearts demand that I stop making Garrus scream. I think I cried out with effort and defiance against my own softer sensibilities, The sound mingled with his yowling misery until at last [_it felt like forever – it always does, this kind of hell – but it was breaths, really; heartbeats_] I felt the joint slip back into place with a juicy, squelching sound. Garrus leaned – dropped, really – forward, his head pressed against my own shoulder, the full weight of an adult, armored male turian nearly toppling me over. I was surprised to find that my hand shook when I lifted it to the back of his crest.

For a moment I think I shook all over. Or it could be that it was him. Most likely we quavered in unison.

Tali hovered close, omni-tool ever-ready, synching to his to administer medi-gel and painkillers to the site. For a time there was only that sense of pressure as he leaned on me – and I, a bit, on him. We were intertwines in a combination of joint tremors and ragged breathing. [_A tiny part of my brain mused on this situations mockery of the spent qualms after a passionate bout of love making. They do say it's a fine line between ecstasy and agony_, _but this analogy was bordering on the grotesque_.]

The shaking started to ease. "It doesn't hurt so much right now," Garrus mumbled against my collar.

"No?" My lips brushed his temple, "it will later. Swells up like a bitch, too."

"You say the sweetest things."

"You're one to talk… I think it's a good thing my translator couldn't keep up with whatever you were growling."

His amusement was weak, more strained, broken breathing than laughter, but there, "Probably a good thing, yeah." He broke off then, turning his head, the aquiline lines of his face pressed against my neck. "I love you."

"I know."

Tali cleared her throat, "Hate to break it up, you two, but I think we've got incoming."

With movements near synchronized, Garrus and I shifted, each staggering to our feet with Garrus wavering rather alarmingly for a moment. The space we'd been dumped in fill with the sounds of weapons being released from clamps at our backs; the metallic chunkiness of Tali cocking her shotgun while I slammed a new heat sink into my assault rifle with the slap of a palm. Sure enough we could hear the rapid approach of several beings, echoing along the hall ahead, through this passageway of butchery. With only the barest acknowledgement of distaste I pointed out scattered corpses, the only likely cover this place would afford and primed a biotic charge into the grenades snug at my hips. The flickering light would provide its own form of cover, but not entirely to our advantage. It was going to be just as hard to see _them_ as it was for them to make us out.

"This is a crap place to make a stand," Garrus snapped.

"You're right. We're going to have to barrel through them first chance we get. Tali, try to distract them with your drone."

"Chiktikka's ready."

"Garrus, lay out a mine. With any luck my lift grenades can double its impact…"

The sound of unknown approach increased and we moved, each aware of our roles. Just before Garrus positioned the proximity mine, a voice cut through from several yards down. "Citadel Defense! Drop your weapons!"

"Could be a trap," my cynical partner intoned.

"Menacingly: My cannons have mowed down worse than you in the past several hours."

For a moment no one uttered a word. For my part I think I may have momentarily stopped breathing altogether. But there was no mistaking that second voice. The first had carried the high, edgy tones of a salarian but the second was undoubtedly an elcor. But for just a tick my brain absolutely refused to accept the idea of a slow-talking, slow-moving, gentle-giant-seeming elcor threatening anyone with cannons.

"Damn it," groused Garrus. "Now I'm _hallucinating_. Tali, how much drugs did you _give_ me?"

* * *

"Never thought I'd see an elcor decked out for war," Garrus murmured as we walked hunched and awkward through the service ducts usually left to the dominion of keepers and Citadel duct-rats.

"Never thought _I'd_ see krogan fighting alongside rachni," I huffed, pulling myself up an elevated juncture and turning back to help Garrus, to save him having to use the recently trashed arm.

"And here _I_ am with a geth chattering and chirping away in my suit."

Three snorts echoed softly as we moved as quickly as these inhospitable confines would allow. "Still," Tali continued after a respite, "Looks like approving the start of the Citadel Defense Force paid off, right?"

"I had my doubts," said Garrus "But damned if they haven't put up one hell of a fight in here. What was it that elcor said to you after they told us where Vega and the others had gone off to?"

Hesitant to respond, I occupied myself with shining my flashlight at various angles, trying to get a sense of the depth of the drop ahead of us. "He said… he said he fought for the few I was able to save."

Near silence reigned once more. Briefly, Tali spoke something in the old Keelish tongue, too ancient for my translator to be of any help.

There was a an undeniably comic quality to the way elcor spoke, everyone knew that. But there'd been nothing funny or reminiscent of gentle-giants in the eyes of the elcor ambassador, bloodied and rigged up for war. I'd always found their eyes to have an equine quality before: Something wise and temperate, but spirited at the core. I knew little of their culture and had encountered few in my travels. This one: Him. His eyes had held an ancient, unspeakable vengeance, terrible and moving.

Would the elcor survive this?

_Will any of us?_

"How much further?" I asked Tali, as much for distraction as pragmatism.

"Not far, take a left at the next juncture and we should find a panel that'll open up into the Presidium."

"Right. OK." I kept moving, becoming increasingly aware of renewed aches blooming at my midriff and the grim knowledge that it wasn't sweat and enemy blood making exposed armor lining stick to my skin. Just beyond the edge Liara's stims gave me I could feel the slow but steady decline of the last of my reserves. [_Strong enough. Hard enough._]"Pick up the pace," my words low but clipped and steely.

It wasn't long after taking that left that we began to hear more than just the echo of our footfall, different levels of labored breathing and the faint, muffled sound of distant commotion in numerous levels of the citadel. The more immediate and urgent sound of nearby conflict swelled as we double-timed it the last long feet to the panel that Tali set to work opening while Garrus and I [both broken in some way or another by this point] took cover at either side.

"Are we going to be dropping right out into the middle of all this?" Garrus asked. Some might have taken the question as a complaint, but I knew it for what it was: The turian knew his tactics and I'd known few better field strategists in my time. Besides which, dropping into the middle of an unknown battle in unfamiliar terrain – it wasn't exactly outlandish to be concerned.

"Tali?"

"Best I can tell this will open up behind the shop that hanar used to run – remember? The one who had that damned crazy AI in his back room?"

"Oh. Well," said Garrus. "Glad we took care of _that_ four years ago."

"The fighting isn't immediately on the other side and those storage rooms are small. We'll be able to grab cover there and see what's going on. If we can avoid direct confrontation, we'll do it – we need to get to the tower."

"Right behind you."

"Yes, Shepard."

"Any chance of getting those shields back up, Tali?"

"I can try, but I think our little joy ride up here fried those out."

"Damn it."

"Sorry, Shepard," Tali apologized, finally working the panel loose, her voice dropping lower. "I'll keep…"

"It's alright, Tali. Not your fault." My attempt to sooth the quarian was earnest but preoccupied as I nudged her back so I could take point, activating my Tech armor which, thankfully, still worked. Easing down the difference from the maintenance chute to the floor of the dim backroom, I worked my way parallel to the far wall. At its end I paused, listening to the unmistakable ruckus of battle furiously coming forward. Not large scale by the sounds of it, but heated nonetheless. Facing the edge of the walls end, I backed away slightly, stepping in a steady arch as I pied the corner.

"Coming in on our 2!"

"Alright, Chiktikka, here we go!"

"Field is hot," Garrus snapped a half-moment before bullets started to shoot into the large, open shop alcove before us. "Cannibals!"

"WOO! _Ahorra si los tengo, hijos de la gran PUTA_!"

The distinctively human yelling jerked at my attention, "Holy shi—JAMES?"

"COME N' GET SOME, _MARICONES_! Papi's RIGHT here!"

And there he was, facing away from us, backing in our direction. Heavy across his shoulders in a fireman's hold was another armored form; a sight that briefly caught my heart in my throat. _Who?_ With a free hand James hurled frag grenades at his chasers.

"Suppressive fire!"

The clarity of battle is its own rush, its own form of salvation. The world becomes simpler. Perception becomes clearer. Attention fixated. Yelling taunts and Spanish obscenities James threw more grenades, filling the weak lighting of the damaged Presidium with pupil dilating bursts of light and flame and the stench of diseased burning flesh and melting cybernetics. The sound of reaper forces wailing mindlessly against a fate that was surely better than their current reality. Between our support and James's sheer bloody tenacity and fortitude, the handfuls of cannibals and husks following him were taken out.

"Are we _sure_ Vega isn't a krogan?" The question may have been for us but Garrus certainly called it out loudly enough to catch Jimmy Vega's attention.

"Nah, don't get me wrong," he called back, starting to walk our way, staggering and limping badly. One eye swollen shut and the better part of that sides ear all but gone. But that same devil-may-care grin crept along the edges of his mouth. "My _llevos_ are big, man, but I don't have fou-"

We didn't see the Phantom.

Cloaked as it was how could we?

After fighting nothing but reaper troops all this time, why would we expect one?

[_It would be years before I forgave myself. Did I __**ever**__ forgive myself?_]

The sword ripped through his armor, his back, his insides, his gut and out again. Clean through the spine, dropping him immediately to the floor. No slow, stunned descent. No cinematic meeting of the eyes as the horrible realization of what was happening to him dawned on us all. The force of all his weight collapsing drove the blade upwards, with sickening sounds of ripping flesh and shattering bone. Only the heavy armor finally stopped the blades progression.

"VEGA!"

I hurled the Cerberus bitch back with a biotic Throw. Not missing a beat, Garrus fired a charged concussive shot, combing its force with the biotic energy pummeling her through the air until she slammed down with an explosion.

"Make sure she's dead," I ordered Tali while Garrus and I ran to Vega.

"Spirits…" The turian's sharper eyes were able to absorb the situation faster than I in the dim emergency lighting and over the distance between us. Not just Vega's state, but that of the alliance soldier the marine was carrying.

I didn't ask. I didn't need to. Soon enough I was there, slipping in the blood pooling around this collapsed heap of two men. I skidded to a crooked kneel and came to a hard halt against Vega's leg. He was on his side… impossible to fall on his back with the sword still in him. The person he carried sprawled behind him; Jimmy's head on the other man's unresponsive forearm.

"Lola," blood bubbled up with Vega's words, his eyes glazed. "The Major…"

_Oh god…. Oh god_. My eyes dashed away from the gruesome gore of James's wound to the face of the unconscious man behind him. "Kaidan?" My voice cracked. I looked up to where Garrus was crouched near the soldier's head, two fingers at his neck. Our eyes met – that was enough. I didn't need to see how he shook his head. His eyes said enough.

"He's fine, Vega." I lied. I lied through my goddamned teeth. "You did good. We've got it from here." _Dammit, Kaidan. Damn you. We never fixed things between us._ We never could, not when his feelings for me were never going to be able to compensate for my decided lack thereof. One night before Ilos had meant the world to him and had meant comfort from a friend to me. One day in Horizon had shattered what trust we might ever really have again. And now this. _Why? Why didn't he find somewhere else to serve? Why hadn't he stayed the hell away from the Normandy? _

"Commander..." The fading quality of his voice unnerved me, coming as it did from such a bull of a man. I clasped one of his hands in mine, squeezing tight.

"I'm here, Lieutenant."

"Why the fuck for?"

I blinked, startled not just by the words, but the sudden vehemence behind them. "Excuse me?"

"They dragged off the Illusive… Man… some husks… maybe a Marauder… Javik and EDI were pursuing…" The words faded away and I thought they might damned well be his last.

"Vega?"

A sudden sucking, gurgling inhalation and then the marine junior office half jerked up to roar in my face, "GO, Lola. GO."

Garrus's hand on my shoulder squeezed, "He's right, Kate…"

"I-"

"I think the elevators to the Tower are still operational," Tali spoke up, sorrow heavy in her voice. Even from behind the mask you could hear the unmistakable hitches in breath that accompany choked back sobs.

I wished I _could_ cry. Crying would feel better than the searing hole in my middle where my heart beat just a moment ago.

Pressing Vega's hand I forced myself up with a lurch, "_Valla con dios, hermano_."

The dying marine exhaled a wisp of a sound, barely capable of carrying even a modicum of gallows humor. Eyes already losing all their focus. The flow of blood from his mouth trickling away to a stop in slow, lessening spurts, as his heart gave its last weak beats. "Who's like us… Lola?"

"Damn few, James."

_And they're all dead._

"Kate…"

Belatedly I realized Garrus was all but holding me up with his good arm. My eyes trailed away from Vega to Kaidan. I felt my nostrils flare and vaguely heard a strange sound of deep, primal fury that I only ambiguously recognized as emitting from my own throat. Not loud, but apparently all the more daunting for its suppressed natures because Garrus tightened his grip and Tali looked like she might back away.

"Kate?" More urgent.

I killed the sound in my throat. Funneled that ire and guilt and outrage down to the core of me where I needed its fuel the most. Then nodded, standing straighter and gently pulling my arm from Garrus's grasp. "The elevators."

I didn't look back. I didn't need to. The vision of both men would forever be burned into my memories along with all my other myriad failures.

* * *

The three of us stood tense in the elevator. Small movements here and there – checking straps, checking gear, checking each other. I noticed Tali isolating a portion of her suit at her right calf. She noticed that I could no longer quite straighten to my full height. Garrus looked just about ready to tear off heads with those sharp teeth, his glances at us torn between severe protectiveness and complete ferocity.

"Why would reaper troops drag the Illusive Man up the tower," I asked, if only to break the silence of this maddeningly long elevator ride. Tali worked at the circuits urging the damned thing faster. "Thoughts?"

Garrus shook his head, "Didn't he implant himself some kind of device that would let him control reapers – at least in close range? Maybe Vega got it wrong… In the middle of battle like that... Maybe the husks were escorting him."

"You don't really think controlling the reapers would work, do you?" The question came out sharper than I intended; acerbic.

He sniffed sardonically, undeterred by my tone. "No, I don't. Not the way the Illusive Man thinks it would, anyway. There's no doubt he's indoctrinated and that speaks volumes about his delusions. But we both know what he's capable of accomplishing when he sets his sights on a goal. For bad," he said, then paused before looking back my way, "Or good. I want to rip out those husk-eyes of his with my own claws, Kate, but his tenacity and resources brought you back from the dead, among other things."

"Even the worst of demons can occasionally do something good," Tali said, shaking her head so that the wavering light of the elevator danced prism lights along the visor of her helmet. "And even then what he calls his 'mistake' was our salvation: He kept you whole and you told him to screw himself."

The memories of the information discovered about the Lazarus project at the Cerberus station were still fresh, as fresh as the part of me that always wondered [feared and agonized over] whether I was ever truly myself anymore. Suppressing a tremor I touched a hand to my swollen cheek, wincing at the abrasions and cuts aggravated by the fractured bone beneath. Was the red glow of the Lazarus cybernetics showing through?

"The point is," Garrus continued, "even if his ideas are ultimately impossible and idiotic, we know he had those implants put in and we know Miranda's father had some success with reaper signal control, even if limited. They say there's a fine line between genius and madness – there might be something in that technology we could use to our advantage."

"When has trying to use reaper technology to our advantage ever helped us, Garrus?" I shook my head slowly, pacing a short circuit in the small quarters.

"They used reaper technology with EDI," he countered.

"We used reaper code fragments from the geth Consensus to help predict reaper logistics," Tali agreed.

"And," Garrus said, more softly now, his hand moving, the back of it brushing over my shoulder, shifting away hair matted to my neck, "it was reaper inspired tech that helped put you together again."

I jerked away like I was scalded. "And Harbinger very nearly had me for it," I hissed back, an angry, hoarse whisper that cracked at the end. This time there was no suppressing the shudder.

Tali turned from one of us to the other, clearly confused, "What do you mean?"

The elevator finally began to slow. Garrus reached for me again – slowly now, cautiously, enough so that it pained me to see and I reached for his hand, meeting him half way. I squeezed his gloved fingers with my own naked ones and then let go.

"Later," I said to Tali as the lift came to a stop. Once more I activated my Tech armor and inclined my head towards them in turn. "Take flank, I've got point."

In its normal state, the open hall of the Presidium Tower is gorgeous to behold. Sleek lines of deceptive simplicity form curving walls and whispering pathways lined with grass and trees, verdant and fragrant. In its normal state your gaze travels upwards, drawn by the artistic structures beckoning perspective, slipping past broad stairwells and fountains to the elevated platform where the Council convenes in audience. Subtle theatrics are at play even there – especially there – where the dais remains raised and also separated from the petitioning platform just below and apart from it and the balconies all around. For thousands of years asari reigned from this place, then joined by salarians; soon by turians and, most recently, by humans. I remember all too clearly when I stood here with honor to accept my place as the first human Spectre. I remember all too frustratingly all the times I stood here trying to make the Council see sense, see reason. I remember fighting Saren here and watching him blow his own brains out, only to rise up again a reaper puppet. I have seen this place in grandeur and I have seen this place in ruin.

Once again – yet again; this stupid, endless cycle – it is wrecked. Fires burn here and there, sprinkler systems dealing with the worst of it and shorting out other areas where damage has exposed wires from supposedly resistant coatings. Limbs all splintered, the trees are ravaged. Blood and viscera add to the sleek mess of the once pristine floors.

Not that I soak this all in immediately. No, there are more important matters occupying my attention: Like fully expecting to step out into another gun fight when neither I nor my squad is really in fighting shape anymore. Argus drawn, grenades primed, Tech armor casting its glow around me and Tali's drone already making that idiosyncratic buzzing… droney… sound at my left rear flank. The sight that greats us isn't one of ongoing battle, though. There are bodies: reaper abominations and corpses from all the various species that form our galaxy. There is the air – the aura – of conflict; its taste sickly cloying on the tongue and anathema to the nose. But the expanse of the Towers height is relatively silent compared to the bedlam of Earth below and the cacophony of all the assorted skirmishes happening elsewhere on the Citadel. Ambient noises murmur but seem hollow echoes within a fresh dug tomb.

This place was built to draw the eye upwards. Now is no different and there, up on the platform before the Councils dais a pageantry of a different sort – a deadlier sort – was playing itself out before us as we advanced. Garrus and Tali flanked wide, sweeping as we moved watchful of hidden enemies, allowing me to keep my focus on the three playing principle roles up ahead. The Illusive Man, seen for the first time in true flesh, was slouched on the ground, up against the railing of the platform, obviously injured and badly so. To my horror he looked much the same as I had dreamed him: So obviously undergoing transition from human to reaper-implanted atrocity. Sweat collected in already damp, hidden places and I fought back momentary panic. This was different. He was different: Less obviously distorted as he had been in Harbinger's mindfuckery. The signs were there, but subtler and even those were only exposed because of his wounds.

It looked very much like he'd been mauled. Clothing and skin alike were flayed away on most of his left arm and flank and horrible bite and tear wounds marked him in horrid splotches. Standing over him were EDI and Javik, neither in the best shape themselves. One of EDI's robotic limbs – the left – was missing entirely, torn off just below the shoulder joint. There was a gaping hole at her upper chassis that reminded me briefly [heart wrenchingly] of Legion. Javik was in better shape, at least in that his limbs were all firmly attached and there were no obvious holes. I wasn't surprised if through indomitable will alone he would keep himself alive and fighting right down to tooth and claw if ever a reaper still polluted our galaxy. Both had weapons drawn on the Illusive Man, neither taking any chances, grievously wounded though he was. Around them the tableau of this macabre production was completed by the devastated bodies of several husks, a few cannibals, marauders and a cadaverous banshee, its ghastly wails only now dying away.

At last my steady progress brought me to the edge of their stage. I shoved aside a husks body with my boot, the sights of my Argus trained on the Illusive Man, leaving my crew in my periphery. "What happened?"

"Shepard," rasped the crumpled man some few feet away. "So good of you… to join us…" Speaking wasn't easy for him, that much was clear. And I can only imagine the pain he was in, torn up and raw as he was. It was surreal, really: This enigmatic power-broker, this behemoth behind one of the most efficient, dubious, brilliant and horrific of human organizations. Here he was: reduced to his human shell and his repulsive experimentations; his hubris as ragged and exposed as flesh, muscle and bone.

I didn't answer him. I wasn't ready. Not yet. In fact I looked away after making sure four other sets of weapons remained trained on his ghastly visage. Frankly I was fighting the urge to finish him off right there.

"Javik? EDI?"

"He had the reaper forces under his control, Shepard," EDI answered, her evocative voice composed as ever. "We pursued him here when-"

"His 'slaves' turned on him," Javik cut in, rich, bass voice turning simple words into pure, seething menace. "Proving him for the fool he is."

A wheezing sound was the most the man in question could manage as an expression of humor, with a visible effort he forced his head back against the clear wall behind him, lifting it from where it had lolled against one shoulder. "Your crew… rescued me… ironic, really." Those electric-blue cybernetic eyes slide towards EDI. "My first AI creation… the rebellious Creation… come to save her Creator… in her failed 'sisters' body…"

"You are mistaken if you believe I harbor any misplaced feelings of filial affection or sense of debt towards you," the fully self-aware and unshackled AI responded coolly. "You are alive only because you may hold information of value to those I love."

In spite of this whole situation it was still a marvel to hear an AI speak in such terms and truly believe she meant – she felt – every word. Of course, she also got to the crux of the matter: This despicable man might still have information – technology – of value to us.

"Commander," Javik protested, "We cannot take the word of an indoctrinated abomination or a machine with her own agendas." He worked with EDI. He did not harm her. But he never accepted her, never trusted her. Even now she was only a bit less an enemy than the Illusive Man himself and he nearly akin in the prothean's mind to no better than a reaper. "Kill him! We must activate the Catalyst!"

"Hold on, Javik," said Garrus from my right. He stood at an angle to maintain a field of view on the lower Tower hall behind us, while Tali did the same for the upper. "He wouldn't have come here if he didn't have some idea of what the Catalyst was. We need that information."

"Fine," the prothean acknowledged grimly, letting the blistering mien of his quadruple eyes settle back on the man on the floor. "Then allow me to _convince_ him to talk."

"No," I said, feeling my head shake minutely. God in heaven – spirits – Goddess – whatever… I was exhausted. I was more than exhausted, there were simply no words suited to describe this marrow deep fatigue. It was easier to quantify the very few places on my body that didn't hurt like hell than to try and pinpoint everything that did. But my voice was steady. "No," I repeated.

"Shepard…" Garrus dropped his voice and I didn't have to look his way to know the hesitance and pragmatism both that would be in those eyes I loved. He was by no means a cruel man, but he was never one to shy from the grim realities of life.

Ruthless calculus.

"No, Garrus." I lifted a hand, index finger pointed towards the Illusive Man. "Look at him. What more could we do to him? What do we even have time for? And what's more… he knows it."

The Illusive Man made that wheezing chortle again, superior and smug; self-assured and utterly egomaniacal. For all the world as though the idea of failure had not even an iota of existence in his reality.

I sighed, loosening my fingers from how they'd clenched into fists without my realizing. I'd never tortured another human being – another being, period – in my life. I'd never truly wanted to. Not after Mindoir. Not after so many other atrocities I'd seen. Not even when I had Gavin Archer in my custody with his own brother plugged cruelly into a machine. I've felt rage and I've wanted revenge. But never like this. Never so absolute. I noticed a crimson cast to my peripheral vision and learned that it was, indeed, possible to 'see red.'

I closed my eyes against it, turning and moving away a few steps from all of them.

"Tali, EDI – can either of you hack his omni-tool or implants?"

"I have tried, Shepard," EDI answered, "His firewalls are enforced with reaper technology more advanced than my own."

Coming from EDI I understood just how impossible a task it must be. Nevertheless, "Keep trying. Synch up with Tali. She has a geth unit uploaded into her suit. I can't think of any other trio better suited to crack open the impossible."

"Yes, Shepard," both female voices echoed.

I opened my eyes again, my vision settling on a ruined tree down below. The red haze was gone. I almost wanted it back: Being enraged was better than feeling so… heartbroken. [_Was this how you saw the world right before they killed you, Hannah Shepard? Are my eyes as ancient as yours, now, Momma?_

_I need you right now. I need all of you. Those still here. Those left behind. Are you with me? Are you here?_]

I was grasping the metal rail, leaning my weight there, my eyes fixated but unseeing. I started to slump and I could hear Garrus and the others stir with alarm. Straitening myself I held out a hand towards them, keeping them at bay.

Without turning I spoke, "Still think controlling the reapers would work, Illusive Man? Didn't seem to work so well for just a few of their lackeys." I didn't have to watch him to know my words had struck home, to know he'd defend himself. To know he'd cling single-mindedly until the end.

"A minor setback. Once I have control of the Catalyst and the Crucible I'll be able to amplify the signal enough to exert my control over them…"

I snorted. "You're fucking delusional. Listen to yourself! You're dying. Right here. Right now. No one to patch you back together again. No amount of intervention to save your sorry ass or what little might be left of your soul."

"Don't preach at me, Shepard," he mustered the strength to work heat into his winded, struggling voice. "Open your eyes! It's not about me. It's not about you. It's about harnessing this power to end this threat and advance ourselves light-years ahead in mere decades."

"Wrong!" I spun about and advanced on him, ignoring all the aches and protests, the tiredness that threatened to engulf me. I limped and I staggered, but I moved and stood over him, my face set to a grim rictus. "It's always been about you. You: the self-appointed advocate and savior of mankind. You and your playing god. You and your damned ego."

"I made the tough choices! I made the tough... the hard calls… I fought the battles I could win… and even the ones they said I couldn't," he sneered, exposed implants rendering his defiant expression all the more gruesome.

"You made choices – most of them atrocious – in the name of a people who never asked for you to call the shots," I threw back. "You told yourself it was for the good of humanity, but that was always a crock of shit and you know it. You can't praise the ingenuity and diversity of humanity while trying to clamp collars around our necks. You're no better than the reapers, wanting to decide the fate of a people for them, you blinded sonuvabitch."

A rattling, hacking cough shook his broken form, rose bubbles of blood-tinged spittle from his ruined lips. The upper left lip was torn badly enough that the teeth and gums there always showed, giving him a permanent sneer of half a skeleton. "None of you ever knew what I knew. No one would admit the truth: That humanity… that we had to… that I had to ready us… for what was coming… You don't know… you don't know anything about me…" The words were bold even in his dying, not whining, not cajoling. Stubborn until the end.

But I had to wonder: How much of it was his own natural strength of will and conviction… and how much of it was the poison taint of indoctrination warping his mind?

On a hunch – a risky play of verbal roulette – I leaned in closer, close enough to smell him, close enough to see how grated, ruined flesh and sparking cybernetics joined in a mockery of life. With a haggard breath of my own I took a knee before him –flicked a hand towards Garrus and Javik to stop their interruption – then grabbed up and twisted part of his frayed, bloodied collar.

"I know a helluva lot more than you think," I seethed. "I know you stared into the heart of madness back during the days of the Arterius brother's first madcap ventures with 'Uplifting' the turians into a higher state of being: Indoctrinated insanity. I know you took that sickness into you then, twisting it just like they did, out of fear and narrow-minded vision. Yes, **Jack Harper**, I _know_ you."

My eyes held steady but I caught it: Finally. For the first time ever I saw surprise register on the Illusive Man's face. I saw him genuinely nonplussed. Mentally voicing a resounding _thank you_, to Liara, the most formidable of information brokers, I seized on his astonishment; pounced on it before he could once more stonewall me with tenacious pomposity. Or plan old lunacy.

"You embraced what you feared: I can't condone it, but I understand it," rocking back on my heels slightly, using my grip on his collar as leverage, pulling him closer. I couldn't be sure there was any point to it: I could only hope there was enough of Jack Harper left in him to care. "You told yourself you could use it, control it. But madness rots away at the core, it feeds on itself like a cannibalistic parasite. 'For the good of mankind' was your catch phrase, a way to assuage what remained of your conscience when ultimately what you wanted was to decide for all of us. You've become a tyrant and insane like all tyrants are, enamored of themselves and neurotic in their limited vision. What would they think now to see you, Harper?" His eyes narrowed, the grisly cut of his mouth twisting. "Ben? Eva? You tried to recreate her and even then it was to control her. That body," I jerked my chin towards EDI's direction, "was all you could summon up of the woman who was once Eva Coré, a mercenary like you."

"_**Enough**_!" Spittle and blood sprayed my face with his outraged explosion. His one good hand came up, a blind grab for my throat. Even as wounded as he was there was no doubt that once upon a time Jack Harper was a damned good soldier. But I was still in better shape than he; faster and stronger. His right hand lunged for my throat, fingers making vice-like contact; I reached up with my left arm, the back of my elbow slamming down on the inside of his respective joint while my right arm grabbed his fingers, leaving only the weakest link – his thumb – to try and grasp my throat, before I pulled down, my right elbow pressed to his throat. For a moment he tensed and I prepared to twist, a nasty way to give a man a torsion fracture at a pivotal joint.

The barrel of Javik's Particle rifle and Garrus's Argus loomed into view at the edges of my vision. Garrus gave a not-so-gentle nudge, "Give me a reason, Jack," he said, his rasping voice close to a snarl.

"Stand down," I said; an order, but calmly spoken. Shoving the Illusive Man back, I shook my head and stood. Half turning away from him, I wiped the back of a hand along my sullied brow and face, brushing away matted hair.

"You know… you play the enemy's game and it never goes well," I said, partially to him and partially to myself. God, I was fucking tired. "Because you have to sacrifice the best part of yourself to do it. But time and again – over and over – we keep making the same mistakes. Faced with opposition someone always wants to seize control 'for the greater good.' It didn't work for the protheans," I could hear Javik shift nearby, but he held his tongue. "It hasn't worked for the salarians whenever they decide to mettle with other species. It didn't work for Saren Arterius and his attempt to impose the reaper's will on us. The asari holding back vital information to the galactic community for their 'greater good' kept us ignorant despite protean attempts to warn the young species. It never worked in human history. It sure as fuck isn't working out for you now."

I coughed, brushing wetness from my lips, too exhausted to be more than mildly alarmed to see a faint, small streak of blood smear. _No time for that: There's work to be done_. "It's worked for the reapers so far and that's it. And even then it's only worked because we've fallen for their trap. We've taken their technology and blinded ourselves to new possibilities. We've forgotten that the chaos of diversity is one of our greatest gifts. Our alliances are difficult. Our failures often trump our victories. But countless species have struggled on their own – for better or worse – to develop, to explore, to conquer, to amend, to grow or to stifle. The canvas we weave is a mess, but it's beautiful, too. It's _beautiful_ – and you can't see that. But maybe," I turned back to him again, my voice dropping. "Maybe you did… once. Was there ever a part of Jack Harper that truly loved his species? Or was there always only this," I jabbed a finger at him, "this tyranny and insanity at your core?"

The man who was once Jack Harper said nothing, but glared balefully my way. He panted and sweated and bled. He grew paler by the moment and it was beyond clear that we were losing him. He gritted his teeth like a gargoyle and shivered with his bodies decline. But he said nothing and I could only hope somewhere, somehow my words were fueling a struggle within him in his last moments.

The tension of the moment was cut when my earpiece released a stream of ear-piercing static. Several of us jerked. "Come in! This is Commander Shepard, do you read me? Major Coats? Liara?"

**This… miral Hackett… do you read? Shepar… do… read?**

"EDI, can you clean this up?"

"I'll try, Shepard."

"Say again, Admiral? Repeat!"

**Shepard! A Sovereign class vessel is breaking through Shield's blockade! Have you reached citadel control?**

_Shit. _

"Yes, sir, we have. Can you hold? I repeat, can you hold?"

**Hey, Commander, you wanna hurry it up, maybe?** Joker's irreverent voice broke in over the comm. And I was happy as hell to hear it, to be honest. **It's getting hot over here!**

"We are working as quickly as possible, Jeff," EDI interjected.

**Yeah, well, the Destiny Ascension is moving in and I don't think - aw, shit… shit shit SHIT, the turian 6****th**** Fleet is about to lose a dreadnaught. I'm going in!**

"Joker! Jeff! _Damn it_, Flight Lieutenant, what are you-"

**Sure bet these fuckers wished they had windows! C'mon baby, give 'em he-**

Static pierced our comms again. My eyes wide, I swiveled to look at EDI whose robotic facial expression showed the closest approximation to horror I'd ever seen on it.

"No... _Keelah_, no…" Tali moaned in a whisper.

"EDI!" I lurched forward, grasping with slick hands at one intact forearm and at the shoulder of her torn off limb.

She blinked and stiffened, "Forward control undergoing heavy damage. Activating kinetic shields and environmental safe measures. Sealing bulkheads."

"What about Joker?" My voice sounded torn between sob and snarl.

The AI's voice was a whisper now, making her seem more human than ever. "Life signs are present but failing, Shepard. I must… I've alerted…"

I gripped her chassis harder, bruising my own fingers in the process. "Keep it together, EDI, we need you. Do what you can. Focus!"

"Yes, Shepard."

It would have to do. Tears mixed with sweat, stinging my eyes as I rounded once more on the near-corpse of the Illusive Man. I bellowed at him, raw and rasping. "Open your eyes! Look at what the Alliance has put together, dammit. Species are allied now that we never dreamed would work together, much less succeed in their goals. Organic and synthetic. Old enemies and new. All fighting and dying out there, _together_, all of our differences coming together to make us stronger on our _own_ god damned terms. It isn't perfect but that's _why_ it works. Because we have to _want_ it. We have to _fight_ for it. We have to _work_ at it. The reapers fear it because they cannot understand it. They can't see that order is _nothing_ without chaos to balance it. And here you are, spitting on it because _you_ aren't calling the shots."

Pain shot up my back as I jerked down to him, grabbing his torn collar again, hauling him up and slamming him back. "If there is anything human left in you, for our sake, help us, Harper. Help. Us."

In syncopation we panted and gasped and shuddered. Muscle fatigue was winning out and my screaming arms began to drop him. "Please…" I whispered in a groan. "_Please_."

An arm stronger than my own clenched itself around my waste before I collapsed. [Garrus, of course. Always Garrus.] But it was the shell of Jack Harper I looked down upon with my heart in my throat and desperate rage in my belly. It seemed like a lifetime [it always does] before he moved. Then, with trembling, mauled fingers, he activated his omni-tool and entered the specific key my crew couldn't break in time. Tali was there in a seeming flash, synching her 'tool to his.

"Take it," the once Illusive Man breathed in a fading undertone that still carried notes of his anger, his struggle and pride, breaking away with what grace he could muster. "Take it and do…what I couldn't… wasn't strong enough… take… it."

"Thank you," I murmured as the man who was once Jack Harper released his last breath with what may have been the trace of a smile on ruined lips.

I cannot say if he found redemption in those last seconds.

* * *

"Now what," Garrus spoke aloud the question the rest of us where asking ourselves. He continued to support me with one arm around my waist and hip, careful of the wound at my left flank. As much as I appreciated the support [and as much as part of me wanted nothing more than to collapse against him fully] I accepted it only long enough to catch my breath and my bearings before gently but firmly disentangling myself. I had to keep upright and moving on my own right now or I'd cave entirely. Another person might have been offended, but Garrus, I knew, understood. All the same he stayed close.

"What of the Normandy…" Tali asked tentatively, looking up from her work.

"The Normandy is safe, but has sustained heavy damage," EDI answered, her voice collected once more.

"Joker?"

EDI turned her face towards Garrus, acknowledging him as she spoke. "The crew extracted him from the bridge. He is in the med-bay…" a beat of hesitance and she looked my way. "Dr. Chakwas assures me he can be stabilized." The touch of question in her voice – hints of an emotional need for reassurance – humanized her more than ever. I tried my best to nod encouragingly.

"If anyone can patch him up, Karen can. Any casualties?"

"None, Shepard. The Normandy has fallen back to a supportive position while the crew attempts emergency repairs."

"Alright," I looked from her to Tali and then Garrus. Javik did not have the attachment to the Normandy and her crew that the rest of us did. "It'll do for now. We have to… figure this out…" I moved a hand to encompass the wreckage around us then started to the edge of the dais, where years ago Saren had opened hitherto unknown controls for the Citadel. "Tali, EDI – you and the geth unit need to analyze the Illusive Man's signal manipulation, see if there's anything there we can use." With my omni-tool I scanned for and found the needed, subtle controls to initiate the opening of the ancient [and brilliantly advanced] command system.

"Cross referencing with code from the geth hub on Rannoch, Shepard-Commander." A glance back showed that Tali had brought up a small holographic representation of the geth platform synched to her suit.

EDI and Garrus joined me near the complex command consoles. A wave of dizziness washed over me but I fought it off, struggling to connect the pieces, to see where it all came together. To comprehend what aspect here would somehow become the Catalyst needed for the Crucible. They talked behind and around me, but in truth for several moments I heard only snippets, my awareness shifted, pulsing in and out. In and out.

"…Creator-Tali'Zorah, it is my analyses that these codes may be used to disrupt reaper shielding temporarily…"

"…yes, with these modifications we could hack their shields but not long enough and as many at a time as we would need."

"Shepard, I can open the Citadel arms now so Sword and Shield can escort the Crucible into place…"

"…maybe we should hold off, EDI. We still don't know what it's supposed to do: If we connect Crucible to the Citadel without understanding what the hell it does…"

"…you show unexpected caution, Garrus…"

"...mmm, like Victus said: A disregard for the rules only makes me seem reckless when I'm anything but… well, mostly…"

"…I have isolated key vectors of weakness here and here…"

"…it does us no good if we can't… damn it, show me that last holo again…"

Something nagged at my senses, but just out of my reach, just beyond the periphery. I found my scraped, lacerated, grubby hands hovered above the surface of the intricate console, feeling for… what? The voices carried on, passing ideas back and forth, accessing the best course of action. It took minutes… less than that, maybe. Until my hands glided away from the console itself, hesitating… and another hand reached for mind, a voice in my ear, clearer. Javik.

"You feel it too, Commander?" His deep, rich voice held an iota of uncharacteristic wonder. "Here, it's coming from-"

"—the pedestal." I finished the statement and in near unison we both crouched, my clarity coming back to me with a jolt of understanding. "Another VI?"

"Perhaps. Hidden away for millennia… here." He lifted his hand away from an unlocked recess of the pedestal, holding an item almost identical in its structure and appearance to the memory shard that numbered among his few personal possessions. I reached out my own hand, extending it to settle over the memory shard resting upon his palm.

"It's times like this when I almost wish I'd been zapped by a prothean beacon, too," Garrus muttered nearby. "Almost."

"Me too," said Tali, sounding closer now. "I hate being left out."

It's the last I registered. My hand made contact with the shard, only passively aware of Javik's body heat before the memories of the artifact assaulted me in the manner I can only loosely say I'd become accustomed to. It was always unsettling, jarring and more than a little invasive, this alien form of communication piercing my thoughts, intertwining with my consciousness until it was hard to tell the differentiation point between myself and another's presence. In actuality the transmission of information took seconds, but time ceased to be a measureable concept for that moment. I knew only this: A key, simple in its delivery, but staggering in its implications. At the end of it I'd have fallen flat on my ass had Javik not anticipated the disconnection and reached out roughly, his hand gripping my forearm painfully but holding me aright.

"Amazing," the prothean breathed.

For my part I wanted nothing more than to vomit and die. My pulse pounded painfully in my temples, my ears and I groaned.

"Shepard?" Three voices, one turian, one quarian, one synthetic human female, all of them alike in their concern and curiosity.

"The scientists…" I managed, then drew a deep, steadying breath and tried again. "The scientists from Ilos… they didn't stop at altering the signal the keepers followed. They had to have known something of the Crucible and the suspected elements of the catalyst… they left… they left…. Javik…" I weakly waved a hand towards the shard he held. With deft, motions – calm and collected – he stood and slid the shard into a slot just beneath the holo-display of the console. A three-dimensional diagram manifested the kind of things that probably constituted an engineer's wet dream. Thank god I just happened to have three think tanks close to hand.

"Kate," Garrus was crouched behind me, lifting me clumsily with good arm and bad, holding me erect yet again. This time it was beyond my abilities to keep from leaning on him fully, regretting the slight hiss of pain the movement elicited as I jarred his shoulder. He didn't let go.

Again my surroundings took on the hazy, wavering quality of being on the edge of losing consciousness. How much blood had I lost by now? How many broken bones, torn muscles, bruised organs? Garrus busied himself with assessing my state and I was barely cognizant of being laid out on the floor.

"…these schematics indicate reserves of dark energy – staggering amounts…"

"It makes sense: The Citadel is a giant mass relay, perhaps even the oldest, and Shepard encountered similar information about Object Rho and the Alpha relay…"

"Of course. It explains why the reapers were so set back when they lost immediate access to the Citadel after Saren and Sovereign were stopped…"

"And why it would be an ultimate goal to reclaim control of it-"

"—and keep the Crucible _away_ from it."

"Can we apply the modified reaper code to the signal? If this is all accurate we'd be able to use the Crucible to tap into the Citadel's reserves—"

"—creating vast mass effect ley lines, capable of reaching ten times the reach and number of even the largest Relays. Yes, Creator-Tali'Zorah, my calculations concur."

"Then we need to open the Citadel arms and connect the Crucible… Commander? Shall I contact Admiral Hackett?"

Sure was nice of them to remember me.

Then again, even after another application of medi-gel and a second stim, part of me – a very small part – was kind of hoping they'd handle this one themselves.

Huffing and scowling with the effort [and pain], I sat up, with a lot of help from Garrus. "Open comms, EDI. Bring Hackett, Sanders and the other think tanks up to speed as quickly as possible."

Javik crouched near my legs, looking me over with two sets of eyes, neither of them what I would call warmly receptive. But he wasn't glaring at me, which was really a plus so far as the prothean warrior was concerned. "We should not linger here. Soon there will be reapers to take down. I wish to be among fellow soldiers."

"Oh, there'll be plenty to go around, Javik," Garrus jibbed, sounding very nearly as tired and done in as I felt. I rested my head against his good shoulder, still finding the simple act of breathing to be damned uncomfortable.

"This had better work," I said, my eyes lids feeling heavy and gritty, stims or not. "Because I'll tell you: I'm plum out of ideas."

For a moment – just an instant – I think Javik _almost_ smiled.

"I am pleased my people saw fit to protect humanity, Commander. You are a worthy ally. Yours would have been a good addition to the Empire… the turian, perhaps, as well."

Garrus snorted, but I forced my eyes back open to look the protheans way. "I'd have to decline… I'm not a big fan of vast empires, Javik," my words barely softened by a ghost of a smile.

To my surprise, he nodded. "What you said to this Jack Harper," he looked briefly towards the human's grotesque remains, "this Illusive Man – it was true. My people learned this too late. Perhaps the humans would have taught us differently."

"Christ, Javik, you aren't going to hug me, are you?"

Again, the barest [was it even there?] shade of a possible smile touched his lips, but whatever his response was going to be was lost when the geth's voice cut in: "Shepard-Commander… Creator-Tali'Zorah. There is a complication within the activations design."

"What is it?" Tali asked, while once more I struggled – with a lot of support – to sit up.

"Here," it was EDI who answered the question, one sleek robotic finger indicating a place in the elaborate diagram that made no sense to me and certainly looked no different from the rest of the gibberish. I was by no means lacking in intellect, but multifaceted workings such as this were beyond the scope of my long training as a sentinel. "A key is required. Or, more precisely, a specific component pertinent to whoever activates the Citadel's capacity to tap into its reserves of dark energy."

"This concurs with my calculations, EDI of the Normandy."

"Alright," with Garrus and Javik's help I was back on my feet again, if tenuously so. "No need for suspense: What's the component?"

Tali turned her attention to the diagram, leaning towards it in her scrutiny. I could imagine her lovely eyes narrowed with concentration, a furrow in the lines of her brow. "Damn it, this can't be right-"

"I believe it is a precaution, but one the prothean scientists apparently felt was crucial to success."

"Anytime one of you wants to fill us in," impatience tightened Garrus's words. "We're not exactly running long on time, here."

"If EDI and the geth are right," started Tali, clearly hesitant to bring words to an idea she found either preposterous or daunting. I wasn't sure which.

"My assessments are seldom incorrect," EDI cut in, with what passed for humility from the synthetic genius. "It is, as I said, a precaution. A warning: The scientist of Ilos believed that the reapers built fail-safes for an event such as this in which an organic or non-reaper synthetic being might attempt to activate these unique properties of the Crucible. Whoever does so initially will suffer a barrage of reaper code, reaper signals. A massive attempt to hack a synthetic or indoctrinate an organic."

"Shit." Pressing the heel of a hand to my throbbing forehead, I squeezed my eyes shut. _Breathe_. Removing my hand I steadied my voice as much as I was able, "How do we bypass it?"

"Negative, Shepard-Commander. There are no means to bypass this units programming, not in the time required to utilize the Crucible's properties to the advantage of allied forces."

My own eyes narrowed, "There has to be a way to activate it, dammit."

"The scientists had a suggestion: It was their studied belief that whomever first accessed the control sequence must either be someone of strong will who had until now never been exposed to Reaper technology or influence..."

"Great," Garrus groaned with aggravation, knowing that ruled out everyone present.

"Or," Tali took up the telling, "Someone who was strong enough to face indoctrination already but completely resist it. Overcome it."

_Of course._

"EDI, I've never encountered better anti-hacking capabilities in any other AI, surely you could…"

"It is possible, but improbable, Garrus. In a battle between technologies, superior tech always wins, it is a statistical truth. Reaper technology is more advanced than even my own. Key components of my processing were designed from reverse-engineered reaper tech, but not an improvement upon it."

"This is unacceptable," Javik's rage was a cold and unmoving thing, which generally made it all the more menacing. "There must be another way. I will do it myself if need be."

[_Let me confess this: Part of me… yes, part of me wanted to let him do it. In my weakest of moments, I wanted nothing more than to let someone else sacrifice themselves to the threat of insanity's oblivion; to the obliteration of self._]

I swallowed against an obstruction in my throat. It may have been a scream trying to rise or laughter that verged on hysteria or a heated rant of absolute, unadulterated fury. A tantrum. I suspect it was nothing more or less than terror, though: unmitigated terror.

I am no stranger to fear. Fear is a companion to me: Soldiers who feel no fear are never truly brave and are probably bloody well sociopathic. Fear is my partner in the trenches; my bedfellow when I awake in cold sweat. I have faced fear in countless mirrors, under countless guises, not the least of which was dread of failure when the wellbeing of more and more people somehow managed to weigh down on my shoulders. My strength found its purchase in being able to accept that anxiety and stress acknowledge it for what it is and allow it to fuel my resolve.

Here and now it felt like fear was becoming Terror and Terror was about to win.

Garrus turned towards me: Distress mirrored in his eyes but something else, too: Faith. Loyalty. Belief. I cringed away from it, almost a physical reaction, visceral in my gut. "Please… no…" I don't think the words had weight or volume to them. They were mouthed between the two of us. I had only a moment to register looks of intrigue, surprise, and confusion before Garrus consumed my vision, standing close before me, his hands coming to cup under my jaws, smooth clawed thumbs warm and rough against my cheeks. He said nothing. I screamed for escape, for sanctuary with my eyes. And he soaked it in, attempting to offer in return the strength I was suddenly flailing for, blindly.

Tali spoke first. "What's going on? What-"

"Liara?" Garrus interrupted. And, after a moment, over the comms, a response**: Yes, Garrus?**

"Fill them in about what happened when we first rushed the beacon and what we verified with Vendetta."

I felt my jaw flex and grit beneath his hands, swallowing against the beast that wanted to claw its way out of me. "Don't make me do this." The words for him alone. In the background, beyond my cognizant concern, I could make out Liara's brusque explination. I could feel understanding settle around my crew, my squad, my companions and friends. The fetid air of the ruined presidium felt heavier than ever, threatening to drown.

"You were born for this, Kate." The gentle pressure of his hands tilted my chin upwards, one hand moving away to encircle my bicep, bracing me. "You were born to bring them down. I know you can do this."

Anger is a form of fears release. Anger and resentment, both of which surfaced, no matter how brief. Denial, too. I shook my head as best as his hand and my fatigue would let me, expression twisted with ire. "Does it matter that I might destroy me? Does it?"

Beryl eyes shone brighter with a wetness I'd never seen in them before. "Always. But you'd never forgive me if I gave in and told you to come with me and let everyone else burn. You'd never forgive me. I'd never forgive myself. And there's also the part about how we'd burn with them."

The last words, coated with his usual sardonic humor, managed to tweak the faintest bit of a smile from me. Even that smile faded, though and I shudder again. "I'm so tired…" Paltry, weak words that couldn't begin to adequately express what I felt. "I'm scared," once more, words mouthed rather than spoken aloud.

"You're the bravest, strongest person I know," his words were thick but even, the reverb beneath it an undoubting purr. "And I won't let them have you. I'm right behind you, Shepard. Always."

A question burned in his eyes. For a half a breath I closed mine, then opened them with an answer. The nod that followed wasn't necessary between us. His hand moved from my bicep to my hand, taking it in his, his other arm gingerly turning me, offering support at my flank. Tali stepped forward as well, to my left. "Me too, Shepard."

Not trusting in words at the moment, I merely accepted her hand in my momentarily free one. EDI and Javik came close as well, no words spoken, but their support all but tangible around me. Over the comms, Liara's voice cut in, **I know you can do this, Shepard. We all do.**

Another voice cut through the frequency, heavy laden with static, but still audible, if only because the voice itself was boisterously loud. **Get on with it, Shepard. Urdnot can't keep doing all the hard work on our own. Time to spread the fun around**_._ Wrex: My chapped, cracked, bloodied lips tipped up a bit to hear him alive and boastful as ever.

We kept moving forward and this time it was real. This time I wasn't alone. Tali released my hand at the console, but moved hers to my shoulder, supporting me along with Garrus. Free once more, I moved that hand forward to the glowing display.

**Get it done, Marine.** Hackett. **We're in position. **

"Understood, Admiral," finally some heat returned to my voice. Finally I felt the old, familiar spark ignite within me. "Get ready to blow these monsters to hell."

With one last drawn breath and a tightening grip on the turian hand in mine [_Strong enough to love_] I set my fingers forward and opened myself to hell [_Hard enough to fight_].

Nightmare visions engulfed me.

But I was not alone.


	3. Chapter 3

((_**Disclaimer:**__ Mass Effect™ is the property of Bioware™. This short fiction borrows on and slightly alters their creation, and I do not claim any ownership of the creative and intellectual properties of the setting and characters._

_I originally wrote this story for a contest on deviantArt so Kate Shepard is __**efleck**__'s Commander Shepard.))  
_

* * *

The war against the reapers lasted many long, arduous months even after the tides were turned. With the understanding and activation of the Citadel as the Catalyst, the brains behind it all were able to use the Crucible as the massive transmitter it turned out to be, capable of pulsing shield-disabling fields through hitherto unheard of distances and multiple locations at once. In short the unshackled AI, the brilliant young quarian engineer and the fully intelligent geth platform were right, not that this news surprised me in the slightest.

Though no one mourned his loss - and no one liked to think of the source of the aid he gave us in the end - it was undoubtedly true that a great portion of our success came from the Illusive Man's experimentation with and discovery of the ability to manipulate reaper signals. I try to tell myself that it is some small measure of comfort that our species and civilizations continue despite the horrors the people of Sanctuary endured. I try, but it doesn't really work. Likewise crucial was the asari driven development of logistical predictions of reaper movement a feat first made possible by fragments of reaper code found during my enlightening time within a portion of the Geth Consensus with Legion. When applied to the tremendous signal amplification, increased processing and broadened range of the complete Crucible we were able to track down reaper locations and anticipate their movements with remarkable accuracy.

It wasn't until well over a year after the success of Operation Hammer, Sword and Shield that we finally took back Thessia, the last home world to be liberated from the final dredges of concentrated reaper forces. An impressive portion of the enemy's strength was pulverized in the Sol System and then allied forces set their sights to Palaven, which fared only slightly better than Earth at that point. Even with the successful decimation of two of the reapers greatest strongholds, there were still droves to deal with.

Despite the argument that Tuchanka and Sur'Kesh were faring better than Thessia, the asari could not escape the stigma of being the last to join the galactic alliance or the inevitable leak of information that revealed at large the truth behind asari primacy. The last nail in the proverbial coffin was dealt a massive blow when rumor spread of how the matriarchs kept the other species in the dark about their wellspring of prothean technology and yet demanded that others share any finds of their own and prohibited the study and unsanctioned manipulation of the Mass Relays. The Asari Republics lack of national structure to their military or a strong centralized government [a strength in times of peace and prosperity as it allowed for the flourish of free trade and complimented asari culture ] proved detrimental when facing the full brunt of an enemy as powerful and unrepentantly brutal as the reapers. Though Thessia is free now and the asari rebuild, there is no denying their current fall from grace and the hard times ahead. Their grip on Council politics may no longer carry the same clout it irrefutably used to. Time will tell.

In the last month or so – as the galactic community was finally able to concentrate on matters beyond a vicious war for our very survival – the power behind the Salarian Union has fared little better than the asari. Quite the scandal broke after the leaking of top security level intel regarding salarian plans to covertly uplift the yahg. Plans that, we discovered, were already in the first stages of activation just before the reapers first laid siege to Earth. Further denounced for their early reluctance to fully commit to the galactic alliance [especially in the face of the irrefutably crucial part the krogan played throughout the whole of the war] many a Dalatrass and the salarian Councilor were forced to retire in ignominy. Driven by concern over continued outrage and suspicion from alien allies, the new heads of the Salarian Union called for a thorough audit and internal investigation of all STG units, or what remained of them. Major Kirrahe seemed to take it all very much in stride; Liara soon confirmed my suspicions that it was he who leaked the information that started the whole mess. The good major merely smiled at me when I hinted at knowing as much.

For some races, there was little solace to be had when we could at last claim real victory. The batarians were all but wiped out, having faced the initial full brunt of the invasion without aid from internal or external forces. There is severe doubt of the viability of repopulation. The hanar and drell are only slightly better off in their circumstances. The volus fare much the same as they had before, actually. Which is just as well: The state of the Credit is not in the peril we once feared and it's generally a good thing when the galactic economy _doesn't_ collapse in ruin.

Perhaps most surprising was the situation with the elcor. Dekunna was lost to them, ravaged beyond hope of timely recovery. While a surprising amount managed to escape to their few colonies or other regions, the tricky question was finding a new place to resettle and manage to stabilize their hopes of repopulating. Aid came to them from a most surprising of quarters: The krogan. Wrex didn't waste any time in petitioning the Council for the resumption of krogan colonization rights and his requests were granted – with a whole lot of political, diplomatic and military jargon tossed back and forth in the process. Ultimate the krogan – under Wrex and Bakara's leadership, at least – agreed to formal treaties and promises meant to ease concerns over another krogan rebellion. Wrex, always 'diplomatic', said he didn't give a pyjacks left testicle what pretty words the council wanted down on paper: All he wanted was room to grow and fresh resources to nurture Tuchanka. Bakara's influence was obvious and strong, not that Wrex would openly admit to it. Her guidance was abundantly clear when the anxious and ailing elcor were offered a prime garden world near krogan territories: The atmosphere, gravitational pull and terrain were ideal for elcor interests. When news spread of this act of generosity the response was generally one of shock, if not suspicion. Bakara's note to me on the matter was straightforward and, to me, unsurprising:

_Could we use this world? Of course. But krogan are hearty and capable of thriving on worlds others could never manage. I have known too well the agony of watching children die; pregnancies reduced to stillbirths. Now we krogan have the chance for life again and all it can and must entail. I would not deny the elcor the same chance, were it in my power to grant it to them._

_As it just so happens that power __**is**__ mine. _

_Wrex sends his regards._

_Yours in sisterhood, friendship and battle: Urdnot Bakara. _

An attached addendum to the message was brief:

**Shepard: Stop screwing around with Garrus. You're going to get fat and weak with all that down time. And a sore neck. Yeah, I went there. Come see us soon: We'll find a thresher maw to wrestle. Don't worry: I'll do all the work, just like always. –Wrex.**

The quarians and geth were with us until the end, though the reaper invasion never truly came to Rannoch. Not that it mattered: The quarians would not countenance the threat of losing their home world all over again and so they fought with the ferocity of those who already knew what it was to lose the cradle of their species and civilization. The geth honored Legion's promise and then some: Their support was vital in all fields of combat, be it upon land, through skies and or the depths of space. Their upgraded intelligence and processing speeds faster than any organic all tied into the rapid, decisive transition from theories of the Crucible's completion and function to its practical application. Immunity to extreme environments and disease made them excellent candidates when reclaimed planets were scourge with search and rescue teams and, later, the collecting, dismantling and destruction of derelict reaper tech. With their new found unit independence, I'm not sure if they still clung to their dreams of a massive, unifying server like a Dyson Sphere. For now they seemed contented to explore novel levels of immersion into the rest of the galactic community [well, what remained of it] and continue helping the quarians assimilate to Rannoch. They had the choice now, to act of their own volition. Quarian embassies have reopened on the Citadel and the geth have made tentative steps to build their own centers there. There is even talk of both races taking new seats on the council: The volus are already bitching.

Of the rachni I can say very little: I spoke just once more with the Queen after the retaking of Thessia. She touched my mind directly, instead of communicating via a corpse and for the first time I truly understood the beauty of their alien, haunting, exquisite music. Complex melodies, layered with intricate harmonies filled me with sensations of gratitude and sympathy; of solace and pain; of longing and farewells. Taking some few vessels given freely of the quarian fleet, the rachni slipped back into the solitude they preferred, free to create their symphonies with each conjoined thought.

Earth and Palaven were ravaged, in many places beyond nearly all recognition. But this was not a war fought during the time of nuclear grade weaponry: The ground was rubble but not contaminated with radioactive poison. The wounds of both planets could be repaired as well as those of our colonies and our people. Primarch Victus confessed to me a distinct anxiety now that he found himself head of the Turian Hierarchy in a time of reconstruction and regrowth rather than the heat of raw battle he'd known the whole of his life. Whatever his personal doubts, neither I nor Garrus shared them and I'd seen firsthand the earnest, stalwart loyalty and conviction he inspired in – as he called them – his turian brothers and sisters. Humanity turned its sights not only to rebuilding our worlds and recouping what losses we could, but also electing and renaming almost every key position in our governments and Citadel affairs.

Udina was dead by my hand and Valern removed by the Salarian Union. Tavos was killed during the reaper occupation of the Citadel leaving only Sparatus alive of the four Councilors, though the three vacant seats did not remain empty for long. Happily I was able to use some of my usually inconvenient and unwanted fame – and new, more useful clout - to cast in my own vote for the new human councilor and was satisfied to see Kahlee Sanders accept the post. Sparatus even came to visit me during my long stay in the makeshift medical wards amidst the wreckage of the damaged presidium. He took it well when I greeted him from my sick bed with air quotes, my best smart ass smirk and a deadpan 'Ah, yes, Reapers…' – turians don't blush but he did manage to look contrite and, afterward, still shook my hand, his gratitude sincere. Garrus nearly choked laughing.

Some loses were more personal than others, of course. Some left wounds of their own and fuel for nightmares that would trouble me for years to come, no doubt. Ashley. Thane. Mordin. Kaidan. James. In the time after taking back the Citadel [which frankly I hope never to have to do again, since it would be the fourth time doing it] and the long months finishing off our enemy I learned of the loss of Samara, taken down in battle, both going down in a mind-blowing display of biotics that saved lives on our side and annihilated our rivals. Jacob was lost when the cruiser he was on – one of many stationed to protect the Crucible and Citadel – went down. I saw Javik die with my own eyes just a month ago when we joined ground forces to take back Thessia. He went down fighting a reaper; he also went down saving a geth unit. That the geth unit was running asari children to safety was no doubt a factor in his choice, but in the end he took the shots meant for a synthetic. In the end I like to think that the knowledge of our certain victory allowed him to see beyond the black and white of a lifetime of battle. Wherever his spirit fled I can only hope it found solace among those of the rest of his kind. Peace at last for an avatar of vengeance, having seen his duty through.

Liara chose to do her part in the massive – and only just begun – task of rebuilding by reestablishing herself in her role as the Shadow Broker with operations based chiefly from Ilium. Her network of informants and ties was growing steadily back to its pre-war numbers and I was happy to learn that Feron was counted among them. In fact I suspect that the drell spent quite a bit of his time with Liara once more, though for now my dear asari friend was keeping tightlipped on the matter. And she was damned good at keeping a secret.

Kasumi recovered from her wounds taken on Earth while bringing up the upgraded cloaking tech that helped us reach the conduit intact. Not that either would openly admit to it, but I suspect the queen of thieves was rising steadily to the top of Liara's list of most valuable assets. Zaheed made it out alive: Colour me unsurprised. And last I heard from my little blue songbird, he was currently negotiating a contract to help take Omega back for Aria. While I wanted nothing to do with that cesspit at the moment – frankly, my idea of taking back Omega was nuking it from orbit – I was almost tempted to check it out if only to see those two interact. Perhaps I'll eventually ask Liara for the vids. Jack – Jacqueline Nought, Subject Zero, the Psychotic-Fucking-Biotic – survived with most of her students, and reigned down unmitigated, terrifying hell on anyone or anything that dared take those few lives, so precious to her. While she bitched and moaned about how people kept trying to make her, I quote, 'a fucking square-assed girl scout,' it didn't take much cajoling from Kahlee Sanders to convince Jack to continue on as a teacher at Grissom Academy.

The crew of the Normandy SR2 survived the war, though my ship was out of commission early on; for about as long as I was, in fact. I'm happy to say that when we returned to our place in the Alliance, Joker was at the helm, whole if not entirely hale. While undergoing multiple surgeries and treatments in the Citadel, a young salarian doctor took an interest in his condition – Vrolik Syndrome more so than his injuries. I was surprised when I detected a sense of checked anticipation and tentative hope from Joker when he spoke about the possibility of genetic treatment for the disability. Then Karen Chakwas filled me in on the name of the salarian in question: Matlian Solus. Mordin's favorite nephew was following his uncle's path. Mordin reengineered, improved and then cured the genophage and he spoke highly of his nephew before our mission through the Omega Relay [it seems like a lifetime ago. Was it only two years?]. How the hell would Vrolik Syndrome stand a chance against such blood-bred genius?

Admiral Tali'Zorah vas Normandy spoke often and longingly of the home she would build on Rannoch and nervously about all the myriad things – great and small – her people would have to learn, to remember. I was sorry to see her finally take her leave of the Normandy, but pleased to see she did not leave alone. Kal'Reager personally made the trek to pick her up and bring her home. Apparently the trip was enjoyable: I do believe Tali managed to convey blushes and excitement between the lines of her extranet messages.

In short: Life continued. We won a war not just against destruction – we won a war against stagnancy and slavery; against forced choices and sterilization. We fought for the chance to decide our own path and it's the choices that matter just as much as the roads taken.

The galactic community was taking slow-but-sure steps towards whatever future we'd won ourselves, free from obliteration by strange, unknowable beings whose motives were still a mystery to us all. As is the way of the world, some wanted nothing more than to forget about what happened and go back to the business of furthering their goals, be they personal or national, altruistic or opportunistic and usually somewhere between. People and governments squabbled and the political wheel began its round robin once more, to no one's surprise. All the things that frustrated me about the game of nations would not simply evaporate along with the reapers. Nevertheless, we would dictate our own path, for better or worse, and I still believe that was worth it. The choice, the chance, the element of chaos as we tried to find order: It was all worth it.

As things began to settle – not to normalcy, the galaxy was still far from normalcy, the very definition of the word changed for us now – I deigned to linger in the madness of the renewed pulse of Council space only long enough to make sure of a few things. See, the problem with driving back and obliterating an arcane, incomprehensible enemy is that you can never be quite sure if they're truly gone for good. The far reaches of dark space are beyond our ken and what little we do know of the reapers includes the knowledge that they are nothing if not patient.

I pushed relentlessly for the complete and careful destruction of all reaper ships and strongholds of reaper tech, with aid from modified versions of the prothean VI's ability to detect indoctrination. The Council acceded to my request that the Spectre's be expanded beyond was survived of its network, gaining funding and interspecies cooperation for a dedicated special forces group that trained and operated under the check and oversight of full Spectres and the Council. When I left the citadel a new station was already under construction to house this new, expanded venture, a place that would act as both training facility and home base for our operations. With help from Garrus and Liara, I'd compiled my personal dream list of trainers, leaders and potential candidates, crossing the boundaries of nearly every species out there. Sanders, Hackett and I put forth a suggestion for the name and it wasn't all that hard to convince our allies of its worthiness.

Anderson Station would be our gift of a legacy for everything David Anderson – my mentor, my friend - did [and gave] for us all. Taking a page from Liara's book, I made sure to place his name among the stars.

* * *

Our plan was simple: Find the most likely planet with a quiet, seclude, gorgeous beachfront and lose ourselves there for a while. As it so happens, Tali knew of just such a spot: A land virtually untouched by the reapers; nice, warm, arid climes and expanses of virgin beachfront.

With geth acting as caretakers of the planet for over three centuries, the cliff side home we were given for this extended shore leave was in shockingly good state. When we arrived a month ago we found the captivating structure fragrant with gifts of native flora, the spacious homes polished stone surfaces and beds adorned with gifts of quarian art and rich, marvelously woven textiles. Wind chimes of shell, precious metals and semi-precious stones hung from the cliff edges that created our open air verandas, adding their subtle music to the sensual tapestry Tali and others had created for us. Steps away from our home laid the natural gift of the land itself. Rannoch reminded me in many ways of my brief travels years ago to the Sonora region of Mexico: painted desert vistas converging with the sweeping sea front with waters glistening and glittering in liquid, mutable phases of emerald, sapphire, turquoise and opal. By night a phosphorescent bay cast a seductive luminosity, the only light to illuminate pleasures of the flesh when the mood should take us. Which was often and without worry of interruption: The final gift we were given was the solitude and privacy we wanted.

The morning of our last day found me dreaming pleasant things, more sensation than thought, and a welcome respite from nightmares old and new. I dreamt of the sea I'd become so accustomed to by now; of lying on wet sand at the waterline, while the tide curled over me from toes to hips, waves lapping along sensitive flesh. I dreamt of heat and warmth, and the caress of smooth, water-polished basalt dragged carefully, gently, slowly over belly and pelvis with each ebb and flow. With a sigh and a luxuriant stretch of limbs that had been wonderfully free of armor for weeks now, I began to rise to the surface of consciousness, aware of sensations not exclusive to the sumptuous landscape of my mind. The stroke of polished stone over pelvis was in fact the smoothest parts of the turian crest; the heat radiated from inside of me, growing with achingly sensitive acuity; the warmth was his body flush with mine; and the lapping of waves up my legs, the inner thigh and nestled between was a dexterous, eager tongue…

...Sometime later the heated afterglow radiated its last pulsating waves as I lay draped over him, the contrast of texture between his bone-plates and pebbled skin and my own softer, fuller lines never ceasing to stimulate the occasional decadent shiver of heightened sensitivity. His hand rested on my back where the sweet, arid breeze dried away the sweat of our exertion and mingled the perfume of sea salt, balsam and myrrh into the scent of sex in the air. Beneath my cheek and ear his heart gradually slowed to a steady thrum; one clawed thumb lightly stroked over the bumps of my spine as his other hand rested staid and curved to the swell of my bottom.

"Good morning," I drowsed lazily, after a time. "You know," I added, raising an eyebrow in his direction, "I think you've ruined me for alarm clocks."

"Hmmm," his response was a sound of contentment, humor and a bit of masculine smugness. "That so," he asked, the flanging effect of his voice always stronger during and after passion, baritone dipping closer to bass. Shifting both hands to cup my bottom he easily lifted me closer and higher, the better to nuzzle the softer plates of his mouth over my neck and cheek, before licking there with tender affection. I remember that in the earliest days of our relationship the sounds he'd illicit from me made me a little self-conscious, a little embarrassed. I no longer gave a damn.

My fingertips played along the softer, rutted-and-raised skin at the crux of his neck and collar ridge, then curling upward beneath his jawline until he stretched like a cat beneath me, a sonorous purr in his throat that was more vibration than sound. "Marry me?" he crooned.

I laughed softly, nuzzling along mandible, jaw and ridge of cheek, "I already did. And it's about time, too. You made an honest woman of me," I drawled wryly.

"Riiight," his hands found their way to cup along the lines of my face, lifting it to bring his eyes to mine, his alit with lingering desire, pleased possession and playful sarcasm. "You say a lot of things when we're mating, Shepard. I don't ever recall 'Make me an honest woman,'" he raised the pitch of his voice mockingly, complete with a _ridiculous_ O-face, "being one of them – OW! What was that for?" The accusatory indignation of his voice only coaxed my laughter and I pinched him again, at the side of his neck, one of the few places his skin was pliant enough to have effect.

"That face!"

"Mm, well, you're very expressive when I'm driving you wild," with a grin in his eyes, he rolled us over, wrestling me playfully. Taking advantage of the full extent of his reach, he pinned my hands down near either side of my head, looming over me, the curve of his mouth and light in his eyes becoming less playful and more aroused. Ducking his head down he slid the tip of his warm, slightly-rough tongue along the contours of my lips. "I love watching you, Kate… in fact…" One hand released mine and began a teasing dance over my skin, raising goose-bumps and delicious sensations with glide of the back of his knuckles.

It took a _hell_ of a lot of effort, but I schooled my face into an expression of hesitation and disappointment and sighed, shaking my head. "I dunno," God, it was difficult trying to keep a straight face! "Can't it wait a bit? See, I've got these calibrations-"

He cut me off with the agile touch of careful, clever fingers along a part of me that made my words end in a gasp. My mouth, my mind and the rest of me were all occupied for good long while after that…

Later, I watched him from the bed, a sheet barely draped over me; watched the flex and play of strong, sleek muscle offset by the bolder lines of plates and ridges while he sought out clothes for the day, laid out the night before. Sliding his pants up over lithe thighs and the angular, broad bones of his hips, he looked back my way, his loving expression shifting into apologetic concern. "I'm sorry we have to cut shore leave short, Kate."

I rolled from my stomach to my back, propped up on pillows while I shook my head at him, "Stop apologizing, Garrus – it's OK. This is important. Solana needs you right now… I understand."

"I wanted more time just," expressing himself during moments like this was never Garrus's forte. In the heat of the moment he had no qualms, but now I could see him searching for the right words. "Just more time for the two of us. Like this… you know?"

Yesterday we'd received message from Garrus's father; unexpected and urgent. Months ago, during the height of the strike against the reapers, she'd gotten pregnant. Apparently it was off a one-night fling, a moment of passion during a stressful, grueling time. Turians were no different than humans in that respect: Facing your own mortality on a daily basis, seeing so much death, so much destruction… unions between near strangers, soldiers huddled down in the trenches or seeking solace in a bottle, a vial of pills. It was nothing new, nothing shocking. But the ordeal of this devastating war had taken its toll on Solana and an unexpected, unplanned pregnancy didn't help. She chose to go ahead with it and had recently given birth to a daughter. The baby was healthy and thriving, but Solana… childbirth illnesses wasn't something that usually leads to fatalities anymore, not in the 22nd century. Apparently her doctors claimed the problem was psychological: Mental and emotional trauma. And I'd seen it before: Sometimes people just lost the _will_ to live.

"Hey," I held out my hand to him, beckoning him close and he came to me, engulfing my hand in his larger one, sitting next to me, his expression full of his worries, his fears… his hopes. Getting up on my knees I pressed close to his side, heedless of where the sheet puddled around me, cradling his face with my free hand. "It's going to be alright. Look at everything we've come through, Garrus. Sol and your father… they need you now. And I'm with you – I'm right behind you."

Just as I'd hoped, my words managed to coax a hint of a smile from him, shown in flex of mouth and shift of mandibles. "That's my line."

"It's always been one of my favorites."

"It's always given me the best view." He lifted a hand, toughing the blunted end of a claw to my cheekbone at its arch, just beneath my right eye, tracing over the small, delicate lines so recently tattooed there. A turian custom and an old one at that: Markings worn by a woman when she took a bond mate. It was no longer a common fashion, but I'd found the artistic simplicity of the markings to be beautiful; meaningful. And I knew Garrus loved the open testament of our union. No rings for us in the usual human custom [though he'd offered]. Just the markings, mine to echo his on a much smaller scale and the likewise gorgeously simple, slender arm cuff I now wore of hand hammered and worked bronze that had belonged to his mother. Leaning in slowly, he touched the edge of his mouth to the tattoo, then, delicately, the tip of his tongue. He drew back just enough to meet my eyes, questions still lingering in his own. "You sure you're ready for it? Taking care of Sol's daughter… right now it looks like it may be permanent…"

I drew in a long breath and released it with a huff that lifted strands of my blonde hair from my face, my mouth quirking a half smile. "I honestly don't know. I've never raised a kid, let alone a turian. And it's been years and years since I had anything to do with babies." Not since Mindoir, a life time ago; a different world. Smoothing my hand along the side of his face I snagged my bottom lip between my teeth, watching him, drinking him in… then smiled and whispered more words that echoed our past conversations, "But I want this with you. For us. And if Sol needs you to do this … and you want to… then sign me up, Garrus. I'm in. I want it all with you, however that works for us."

He showed me what that meant to him with actions rather than words, one of Garrus Vakarian's strongest points. Eventually we untangled ourselves and he stood again, reluctantly moving away from me and the haven of our bed. "I'm going to fix up something quick for breakfast before we head out."

"'Kay," Garrus's experimentations with human food and cooking in general were hit or miss, but I had a strong stomach. Thank god. "Hey, toss me the datapad, would you? I want to make sure Tali was able to make the flight arrangements. Thanks."

To the background sound of Garrus in the cliff-house's open-air kitchen, I browsed through my messages, occasionally calling out updates.

"Word travels fast, Vakarian – Sparatus wants to know if you'll be able to stand for the induction ceremony when you get to the Citadel."

"Ugh, I hate ceremonies. And that damned crater-faced pissant knows it."

"Pro-Tip: Don't call him that during the ceremony," I called back, not bothering to mask my grin or the laughter in my voice.

"I'll find a way out of it."

"Tsk-tsk!"

"I agreed to become a Spectre so I didn't have to deal with all the bullshit, Kate!"

"True. And because taking a post at Anderson Station with me tends to make married life easier,"

"I've always been a fan of easy access."

"Garrus, I had to practically drag you into my quarters the first time!"

"I was playing hard to get. Drives the ladies wild – second only to scars."

Chortling to myself, I continued to browse the messages. "Flight's confirmed. 05:00 hours. Oh and, hey – Miranda's agreed to accept the instructor position I offered her."

"Any word from Major Kirrahe?"

"Yes, he's accepted as well."

"And you've smoothed it over with Alliance brass – keeping the Normandy as our chief recon cruiser?"

"Garrus, do you remember who you're talking to? I can do no wrong – for now at least."

"Atta girl: Juice it while the milking's good."

I didn't even bother trying to correct the cliché and settled for rolling my eyes.

"Joker would mutiny if they tried to keep his baby from you, anyway," he continued, happily oblivious.

"Yeah, I'd be less worried about Joker mutinying and more about the unshackled AI with a wicked sense of humor."

"Good point."

"Mmm… Grunt left a message. Either he's going a little batty or he's going to be a daddy. It was really hard to understand."

"I seriously hope Eve has the good sense not to let that boy breed yet. Or ever. I don't know if the galaxy is ready for baby-grunts and krogan lay legs in the hundreds. I'm going to have nightmares about it now: A ton of midget-grunts all running around with their rattles and their bottles of infant-ryncol yelling 'We are Krogan! We are Krogan!'…"

He continued in this vein a few moments longer before realizing I wasn't responding. I was vaguely aware of the sound of his footfall coming back towards the bedroom, but was too transfixed by the image before me to look up. When I didn't answer after the third time he spoke my name he strode to the bed, anxious, grasping my arm and giving it a little shake. "Kate… Kate, what is it? Kate, honey, give me that, you're going to break it…"

I hadn't realized how tightly I was gripping the datapad with both hands, all of them white-knuckled. With a conscious effort I loosened my grip and cleared my throat, struggling for words. "Liara sent a message… she heard about Sol and us leaving for the citadel today."

He was brushing hair from my face and attempting to turn my chin to get a better look at me, still trying to figure out what was wrong, "What happened? Crap, you feel cold all over and you're pale … did something happen to her?"

"No, she's fine… she just. She knew we were talking about maybe adopting and… it turns out she found a child she thought I might be interested in but wasn't sure anymore what with Sol and the baby and…"

"Oh," clearly he still didn't understand exactly what was wrong, but I could almost hear the gears working in his head as he tried to figure it out. Human. Turian. Krogan. Whatever: Men would always have that knack for stumbling over their own thoughts when they couldn't figure out why a woman was going to pieces. "Well… you know we talked about a human and a turian… I'm still good with that, Kate. It's… damn it, Shepard, c'mon, help me out here, you're shaking!"

Finally I looked up at him and his head cocked to one side, surprise and confusion in his eyes at my expression. An expression better described as amazement and bittersweet awe than sorrow or pain. Tears filled my eyes, not falling but wavering my vision. I held the datapad out to him. "Look."

Taking the device, he sat down next to me, one arm around my shoulders, tucking me in close, a protective gesture. Finally he turned his attention the 'pad in his free hand… and I felt him stiffen.

"He… he kind of looks like you."

"He looks like my brother. The one… from Mindoir?"

Reflexively Garrus tugged me in even closer: Outside of Liara he was the only other person who knew any specifics about my life there, my family and how it all ended. Maybe Miranda knew as well, but it wasn't because I told her.

The boy in the picture was young: younger than my little brother was at the time of the attack. But still, the resemblance was uncanny. This boy still had traces of baby fat in the curve of his cheeks, the roundness and dimpling of hands. He was perhaps four, surely no older than five. "Look at the name, Garrus."

"Yeah…" he laid his head lightly against mine, mandibles shifting strands of hair as he spoke. "Caleb."

For a long moment I said nothing. The phrase 'a pregnant pause' never meant much to me before, but right now it fit. My breath felt bated, my words slightly hitched, "If it's too soon… I mean, with Sol's baby and all… if you want to wait… I'll understand."

I felt it as he turned, so his mouth moved feather light at my hair and scalp as he spoke. "I can think of worse things than my niece and a little boy calling me 'Daddy' – or maybe 'Pop' – is that too old sounding? Hey now… careful – _oomph_ - I need to breathe…"

I was hugging him tight enough to make him squirm and while I loosened my grip it was only enough to take his face in my hands and bring his mouth to mine, molding my soft lips around his less yielding plates, lipping the edges of them. He returned my passion in his own way, sliding his tongue over mine, tasting each other, his claws loosely twisted in my hair. "I meant it," he whispered, the words reverberating beautifully. "Always. You and me and whatever else comes our way. Together. So when are you going to believe me, Kate Vakarian?"

My nose pressed alongside his, I reveled in the feel of the minute shifting of the tiny, thin bones there, the warm moisture of his breath at the corner of my lips. "I do. Trust me, Garrus… I do. And I love it when you call me that."

He grumped a brusque sound deep in his throat, "Well _someone_ has to, damn it. No one else in the galaxy is going to stop calling you 'Shepard.' Hell, _I_ still do it. I should've taken _your_ name."

"Not too late, you know. Garrus Shepard…" I wrinkled my nose and made a face synonymous with 'ew,' immediately disliking the sound. "Wait-"

"Yeah, that sounds horrible. No deal."

"Raising a baby and a preschooler on Anderson Station isn't going to be easy…"

"We'll get Kasumi to babysit. Maybe Steve…"

"Right, so they'll be stealing shuttles and flying them in no time."

"Sounds like my kind of kids already." His hand skimmed to the back of my head, cupped at the base of my skull, claws tangling lightly in my hair before smoothly bringing my forehead forward to his own, our eyes closing. The tenderness of the gesture broke my heart, and then filled it to the brim all at once. He handled me with that juxtaposition I loved: Gentleness, eagerness, tenderness and possessiveness tousled together. Bringing my head to the crook of his neck, he wrapped his arms around me, my own hands slipping up over the crest of his sleek carapace to grip the back of his shoulders, limbs maneuvering to twine us close together, sliding from the bed to straddle his thighs, my calves snug in the curve of his extended, protruding fibulas.

Everything. All of it. All the torture and hell we'd been through, together and apart. All the horrors, the triumphs, the laughter and the pain: It was all for _this_. For this moment and all the rest we had ahead of us. For all the unknowns and what-ifs and uncertainties of the state of our lives and the worlds around us, there was the simplest and sweetest reward: This gift of time. I could only hope others were taking the same advantage of the gift. I hope to hell they knew what it meant to be hard enough to fight because you were strong enough to love.

"I just want you," he whispered. "It's always been you."

"I love you."

"I know. It's all I need."

_Acknowledgments:_

_To Kim Sparks ( .com) for proof-reading, encouragement and saving Major Coats from the ignominious fate of having his accent butchered by an American writer._

_To my brother, Mike, who got me into ME in the first place and took the time to read over my final TIM/Kate confrontation and the culmination of the Crucible/Catalyst conundrum. He's not a fan of FanFic but he asked to read the whole thing when I'm done; hopefully this means the work isn't rubbish._

_To my husband, Joshua, for putting up with me spending a lot of time writing; for proof-reading the more combat-based portions of the story; for telling me the truth behind the sound a bullet really makes when it zips by you (it cracks!); for explaining the crucial need to differentiate quickly in battle whether a grenade is __**In**__bound or __**Out**__bound and for several minutes demonstrating the proper way to break a one-handed grasp at your neck. Though I suspect using me in the demonstration was in part payback for all that time spent writing and mooning over Garrus, which he finds patently disturbing._

_And, of course, to Bioware: I'm still sad about the endings, but I still love Mass Effect and none of this insanity would exist without the firm foundation they created of fantastic characters and an immersive story/universe._

11


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